Judges Clash Over Judicial Independence and Political Allegiances

New Delhi: A group of 56 retired judges – including two former Chief Justices of India – have issued a statement distancing themselves from a recent intervention by fellow former judges who had criticised Home Minister Amit Shah.

In their joint statement on 26 August, the signatories said they “strongly disagreed” with an earlier declaration made by at least 18 retired Supreme Court and High Court Judges, along with activists, who accused Shah of misrepresenting a landmark ruling in the Salwa Judum case.

“We, as former judges of this country, feel compelled to place on record our strong disagreement with the recent statement issued by a group of retired judges and activists,” the statement read. It urged “brother judges to desist from lending their names to ‘politically motivated’ statements.”

The latest intervention pointed to what it described as a recurring pattern. “It has become a predictable pattern, wherein every major political development is met with statements from the same quarters. These statements are determined to cloak their political partisanship under the language of judicial independence," it said.  

The former judges warned that such interventions risk damaging the reputation of the judiciary itself. “This practice … does a ‘great disservice’ to the institution we once served, as it projects judges as political actors. This erodes the prosperity, dignity and neutrality that the office of a judicial officer demands,” Tuesday’s statement said.

The dispute centres on Shah’s comments last week to news agency ANI, in which he claimed that Sudershan Reddy, the opposition INDI bloc’s vice-presidential candidate and a former Supreme Court judge, “rejected Salwa Judum and thus ended the right of self-defence of tribals.”