CJI DY Chandrachud responds to court vacation debate, judicial activism, faith in courts and more

Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud recently responded to the criticism about the long vacations taken by courts in India..On the one hand, CJI Chandrachud observed that judges have heavy workloads to handle throughout the week.“Every judge of the Supreme Court works seven days a week, because between Mondays and Fridays, you are dealing with between 40-50 cases, if not more - sometimes 70, sometimes 80. The last day of the term, I had 87 cases on board before me. I came to serial number 87 at 5.30 in the evening. So, that's the kind of work load which you are handling,” he observed.He added that during the week, even Saturdays could be earmarked to hear smaller cases while Sundays are spent by judges reading through case files till 6 or 7 in the evening.He also spoke of the need to give judges time to perform their larger role of transforming polity and society, beyond only focusing on the daily disposal of cases.To illustrate, he mentioned that although he is presently in the UK amid the Supreme Court’s summer break, he is part of a Bench that is preparing to deliver judgments in six Constitutionally important cases (after the Court re-opens).“These are all cases which could redefine aspects of our social and political life as well. We need to allow our judges to think, reflect, particularly in the higher courts. In order to really dispose of cases which are really the critical cases of our time, you need to really give judges the time to think and sit by and reflect. You need to give time to judges to use their vacations to read. Unless we give judges more time to judges to reflect and dwell on the critical issues of our time, not just in India but across the world - South Africa, Bangladesh, Nepal, UK, US, Australia - how would they really be global citizens and understand the place of a Supreme Court in the wider context of the world?” he said.He added that even staggered leaves by judges may not be a solution as they would then cut into the break that lawyers deserve.“We are normally asked, why don't you give staggered vacations to the judges so that judges could take vacation when they want? Great for the judges, but the problem which I face as an administrator - is what about the lawyers? Because the lawyers need time as well … The lawyers would say, ‘look you guys (judges) can take vacations when you want but what about us (lawyers)? We need time to reach out to those who give us work, reach out to network. We (lawyers) also need time for our families',” CJI Chandrachud explained..These comments were made during a question and answer session that followed a lecture by CJI Chandrachud on “The role of a judge in craftsmanship and Constitutional interpretation," at an event organised at the Cambridge University in England. .Judicial activism v. Judicial restraintIn the lecture delivered on June 6, CJI Chandrachud also spoke about why courts have moved towards embracing its transformative potential and viewing the Constitution of India as a transformative document. He added that it’s not right to pigeonhole the work done by judiciary into either “judicial activism” or “judicial restraint” depending on the outcome, as such binaries do not exist in law or life.“The pigeon holing of the models of adjudication into restraint and activism based on the outcome of the case or the remedies employed, in my opinion, ignores the interpretative approach which the court follows. This is a grave mistake which we have been committing in evaluating the work of constitutional courts, particularly in countries like India which have emerged from colonial traditions,” he said.Addressing criticism over the use of Constitutional “morality” to guide judicial interpretations, he observed that there were certain fundamental values inherent in the Constitution of India - dignity, equality, fraternity, liberty and freedom of expression. These are used to evolve a broad notion of Constitutional morality to hold down all stakeholders, especially State actors.He added that it is not as if such doctrines led the way, but that it was the evolution of politics and how the Constitution has played out over time which has shaped the judicial doctrine. Such judicial doctrines take cognisance of the fact that the Constitution today is very different from what its framers thought it would be, he noted..No one generation has monopoly over what is rightCJI Chandrachud also defended the numerous amendments made to the Constitution of India. He said that such “self-corrective” mechanisms help to ensure the stability of the society in the long run.Answering a question on this issue, CJI Chandrachud said,“The stability of any Constitutional structure depends on whether it has the institutional processes for self-correction. When speaking of the number of amendments that the Constitution has undergone, far from regarding that as a deficiency of our Constitution, I look at that as a positive. I look at it as a positive for the simple reason that that is indicative that there are self-corrective mechanisms at play here going on in the Indian Constitution."He noted that this is also why courts sometimes overrule their own decisions. "From the judicial perspective, there have been cases where we have been able to overrule decisions which, perhaps were not right from the perspective of future generations," he said. To cite an example, he noted that the law criminalising homosexuality (Section 377, Indian Penal Code) was initially upheld by a Supreme Court Bench, before it was ultimately read down by the Supreme Court itself a few years later to decriminalise consensual homosexual relations.“The fact that we have this inherent power to relook the work that we have done - I think is not really a deficiency but it also promotes a sense of a Constitutional dialogue,” he added.He observed that such self-corrective mechanisms ensures that no single generation can claim that they have the monopoly on universal truth to dictate what the future should be like. No one generation can say that, “what we say today will necessarily be the governing doctrine for the future,” he explained.The possibility of change with ordered Constitutional discourse helps maintain stability, he highlighted. This is also part of the reason why countries like India have been able to sustain a tradition of commitment to the rule of law, he added..On public trust in courtsResponding to a question on whether people still have faith in the Indian court system, CJI Chandrachud observed,“The very fact that we are being approached by people from across the spectrum is surely an indicator of the fact the common people do have faith in the ability of courts to deliver dispassionate and objective justice.”He acknowledged that more and more people are asking questions about constitutional institutions - the legislature, the government and the judiciary. However, this is a good thing, CJI Chandrachud said.“We should be amendable to questioning, amendable to critique,” he added.All the same, he disagreed with the notion that there is a general sense of public distrust. “We are here as institutions to resolve constitutional questions with a sense of orderly dialogue,” he assured.He added that it is not that judges claim to be infallible."But we certainly do have a sense of candour and a sense of understanding the limits of our own capabilities for allowing future judges to correct errors within the system,” he said.