Opinion - Letters to the Editor   

On judicial restraint

In what amounts to a surprisingly forthright admission, the Supreme Court has openly criticised the judiciary’s tendency to encroach upon the domains of the legislature and the executive. Justices A.K. Mathur and Markandey Katju have correctly pointed to the dangers of judicial adventurism. The judiciary’s act of frequently overriding the legislative and executive orders and, at times, taking upon itself non-existing powers in the interest of effective “course corrections” may well become, in the long term, a recipe for total breakdown of trust and respect among the three equally important and indispensable wings of our democracy.

Shahabuddin Nadeem,

Bangalore

The call for judicial restraint is the best antidote to the institutional paralysis that is afflicting our polity. What the legislative and executive branches do are not merely questioned and reviewed by the judiciary. Directions are given for actions that impinge on the mandates of the other branches. This call should make all those who have indulged in uncritical approbation of the judiciary revise their views on the system of governance we have adopted for ourselves.

Raghuram Ekambaram,

New Delhi

The Supreme Court’s observation has created a difficult situation for the judiciary in adjudicating cases against the executive or the legislature which may be brought before it. It reverses the doctrine propounded by the larger bench of the Supreme Court in the Bihar Assembly dissolution case, which asserted that the judiciary cannot remain a silent spectator when the Constitution is being subverted in the legislatures.

Arulur N. Balasubramanian,

Chennai

The Birth of Chancery Courts in England was a reaction to courts binding themselves to inaction by strict adherence to the letter of the law forgetting that judicial restraint is not absolute, for our courts are not merely courts of law but courts of justice too. Untrammelled power for the executive is the surest road to tyranny. In this connection, all judges must bear in mind the wise words of Earl Warren: “Where there is injustice, we should correct it; where there is poverty, we should stamp it out, where there is violence, we should punish it, where there is neglect, we should provide care.” It is a fine balance — judicial restraint and social need. One will wholeheartedly agree that if judicial self-restraint meant that judges had to vote against their political predilections when a case came before them, they were doing no more than their duty. However, the over-arching principle is rendering justice — political, social and economic to “we, the people of India,”

V.R. Lakshminarayanan,

Chennai

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On judicial restraint

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