Meetings between heads of Judiciary and Executive are never to discuss judicial work being done by judges but for administrative or social purposes, CJI DY Chandrachud said on Saturday.
The CJI said that when the Judiciary and Executive engage, it creates a perception that deals are being made and emphasized that these interactions are only part of robust dialogue between different arms of government.
"People think there are deals being made, but that is not the case. This is part of the robust dialogue between different arms of the government. The work of all three arms is dedicated to the betterment of the nation. The dialogue is not about the work we do as judges—not at all—because there, we are completely independent. But there is an intersection between the administrative work of the judiciary and that of the executive," the CJI stated.
He emphasized that there is a tradition that head of the government of State or Union is always in a consultative process with the head of the Judiciary of State or Supreme Court.
"So people think what you are discussing about. The discussion is not about pending cases. The maturity of the political system lies in the fact that there is a great deal of deference to the judiciary even in the political class," he added.
CJI Chandrachud made the statements as part of the Loksatta Lecture at Mumbai University on October 26.
The CJI further explained that during his tenure as Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court and as a member of the administrative committee in Maharashtra, it was customary for the Chief Minister to visit the residence of the Chief Justice, and vice versa.
"There are agendas set for such meetings that these are infrastructure or IT projects and how can it be funded and the executive then says these are the projects of priority. Would not we interact with each other for this? When such meetings happen there is great deal of maturity in the political system because during the course of such meetings, never, in my experience, I was a CJ of Allahabad High court and the Lucknow bench building construction etc. were discussed," said the CJI while answering a question on controversy relating Prime Minister Narendra Modi attending Ganesh puja at the CJI’s residence.
He further explained that since the Executive handles judicial budgets, meetings between a Chief Minister and High Court Chief Justice are necessary.
"Never, ever does a CM discuss pending case because it operates in a completely different sphere. The administrative relationship between the High Court and State government is different from the judicial work judges do. In the same way, even at the central level, the administrative relationship between the Supreme Court and the government of the day is very different from the judicial work we do," he said.
Regarding the consultative process for appointing judges, the CJI stated that consensus sometimes emerges, and at other times, it may not – a characteristic that he described as a strength of the system.
"This is dealt with great level of maturity between different levels of Executive and Judiciary and there is communication regarding this. The CJI has to be in dialogue with law minister and see if the objections about a candidate is justified. You have to discuss with each other. There is a great deal of maturity which is shown here," the CJI added.
On criticism of democratic institutions, the CJI said that scope for institutional improvements should not imply that there is something fundamentally wrong with the institution.
"The question is have we developed a better system. I think we have to understand that it is easy to criticize the institutions we have formed over the last 75 years. Every institution has its positive and is capable of betterment," he explained.