New Delhi: While participating in the discussion over the High Court and Supreme Court Judges (Salaries and Conditions of Service) Amendment Bill, 2021 on Tuesday last, TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee, who represents Sreerampur parliamentary constituency, supported the Bill by saying that the independence of the judiciary is indispensable in a democratic system of governance. The Bill has been passed in the Lok Sabha.
However, stressing that there is no requirement to increase the retirement age of the judges, the TMC MP urged the House to make the selection age of judges flexible against the Collegium mechanism of 45 years as the qualifying age for a judge. The TMC leader also urged the Central government to not continue with the contempt of court and don't violate the court orders.
Highlighting the preferences being given to lawyers belonging to the ruling party, he said, "If a lawyer is recommended by the Collegium and that lawyer belongs to the Bharatiya Janata Party, directly or indirectly, his case gets cleared at a rocket speed, while the cases of other lawyers take years to get cleared."
"In Calcutta High Court, the cases of Joytosh Majumdar, Amitesh Banerjee, Raja Basu Chowdhury, and Lopita Banerjee were recommended on July 24, 2019, and were reiterated on September 1, 2021. In all such cases, the Supreme Court's order has not been implemented," he said, adding, "I am not questioning the suitability of the lawyers. I am questioning the discriminatory attitude of the Central government."
There are several names, which have not yet been cleared by the Centre even though those names have been recommended and reiterated. In the case of Calcutta HC, the cases of two women judges — Ananya Bandyopadhyay and Rai Chattopadhyay — were recommended and the recommendations were reiterated on November 11, 2021, but their names have not been cleared, he said.
"The general contention is that in any democratic county, the judicial system should be completely free from any sort of pressure or pull, both internal and external. An independent judiciary is required to maintain the balance between the interests of individuals and society," he stressed.
Highlighting the pendency of cases in different courts, the TMC leader said, "Justice delayed, often said, is justice denied. In India, there are 4.5 crore pending cases across all courts as of September 15, 2021, while in 2019, there was 3.3 crore pending cases, which means that in the last two years, 23 cases every minute have been added to its pendency list."
"In 2018, the pending cases in Supreme Court are 57,346, which rose to 59,859 in 2019, 63,146 in 2020, and 70,038 (till November 8) in 2021. Pending cases of five Judges' before the SC are 272, while pendency of the Seven Judges' Bench is 15 and the pending cases of nine Judges' Bench are 135," Banerjee told the House.
On the vacancy of judges, he said, "As on December 1, 2021, there is a vacancy of 402 HC judges against the sanctioned strength of 1,098. The sanctioned and working strength of judicial officers in the district and subordinate courts has also increased. As of December 31, 2013, the sanctioned strength was 19,518 and working strength was 15,115, which increased to 24,485 and working strength was 19,294 on January 28, 2021."
The average rate of disposal between 2015 and 2019 was about 1.8 million cases per year and in most years, the number of cases disposed of is lower than the number of cases instituted, he said.