It is difficult not to take a position in the ongoing debate on the issue of bringing judges under the purview of the Right to Information Act. In my view, the report by a Parliamentary Standing Committee, reaffirming the applicability of the RTI Act on all activities of administration and persons (judges) in the judiciary — except judicial decision-making — is a welcome development. It would help restore the country’s faith in the judiciary’s delivery of fair justice, which could have been severely undermined had the judges been able to conceal their wealth, and its sources, from public scrutiny, and evade questions about their public conduct.

The chief justice’s contention that judges hold constitutional offices and are thus not covered under the RTI Act is easily challenged. Members of Parliament are constitutional functionaries too, yet they are required by law to furnish all details of their assets and liabilities at the time of their electoral nomination. The committee is right in its observation that even the prime minister, speaker of Lok Sabha and president of India as constitutional authorities are covered under the RTI Act and there is no question of any exemption for any other office. Thus, keeping judges out of the RTI’s purview is tantamount to keeping them out of the definition of public service, which is unthinkable in a democratic system.

Technicalities apart, the judiciary clearly owes a fair level of transparency around its conduct. There has been no dearth of pointers to corruption in the judiciary. In 2002, the then chief justice remarked that 20 per cent of the higher judiciary might be corrupt. Several cases in recent years have had senior judges accused of impropriety, sometimes even benefiting from the largesse of state governments. The lower judiciary is in a league of its own and has long suffered charges of corruption. It is vital for the judiciary to acknowledge its accountability. Reluctance to open its conduct to public scrutiny will cast the judiciary in poor light.

... contd.