No my Lord, it doesn't add up. Again!

 

The previous blog dwelt on the interview of ex-CJI Mr. Chandrachud by Sreenivasan Jain. Actually, the interview could’ve been much worse. Sreenivasan didn’t ask a number of questions, possibly because of lack of time or because he was gobsmacked by the assertion of original desecration of a temple to build Babri Masjid when there was no evidence of it. 

Following questions would’ve tied up Mr. Chandrachud in knots further. 

What was the point of all those lengthy deliberations, wastage of everybody’s time including the Court’s when the action component was missing? He declared the action of the Speaker of Maharashtra Assembly illegal but didn’t do anything about the result of the action which led to formation of the Shinde government. He declared the Electoral Bonds unconstitutional but didn’t bother about recovery of the loot made by the parties from the electoral bonds. Plus, even though the “actual” donor information was available with SBI, he didn’t ask for it so the two A’s possibly got away because they might’ve donated through proxies or trusts. Even after taking Suo Moto cognisance of Manipur problems, there was no effective action or direction. If ever there was a case for urgent Governor’s rule, it was in Manipur which is still burning. 

Then there were cases where the government blatantly violated the Supreme Court order. The Supreme Court itself had held that the independence of the Election Commission is fundamental to democracy. On 2.3.2023, It had ordered a three-member Committee consisting of the PM, LoP and CJI to determine the appointment of the Election Commissioners. The government enacted a bill (28.12.2023) and replaced the CJI with a Cabinet Minister, nullifying the ECI independence. All that “fundamental to democracy” bit was blown to smithereens. The conduct of the CECs and the Election Commissioners thereafter has been there for the whole world to see. Since this one thing strikes at the heart of democracy, the minimum expectation from the Court was either a stay or a day-to-day hearing to settle the issue urgently. 

In one case, he facilitated dilution of his own order through inaction – Delhi Services Case. The Central government had completely stymied the functioning of Delhi Chief Minister by putting the bureaucracy in an adversarial position to the elected government. On 11.5.2023, CJI’s own bench held that no elected government can function without the bureaucracy being accountable to it and so, apart from public order, police and land matters, the elected government of Delhi would have full powers and would have transfer and posting control over the concerned bureaucrats. However, a few days after the order, on 26.7.2023, the Central government circumvented it by issuing an ordinance giving the Lieutenant Governor all powers to overrule the National Capital Civil Service Authority headed by the Chief Minister. What then is the point of an elected government in Delhi? As the Supreme Court had gone into constitutionality and passed the order, prima facie, the ordinance was unconstitutional and required immediate and strong intervention by the Court. That didn’t happen. 

Justice Chandrachud’s administrative actions too have dealt body blows to the polity. The government appears to be trying to completely control the judiciary through delay and cherry-picking of appointment and transfer of judges despite collegium recommendations. On 5.12.2023, Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul’s bench was due to hear the case pertaining to it. Strangely, it was mysteriously “deleted” from the list without any reason. Justice Kaul wryly remarked, “I will just say one thing. I have not deleted the matter. I am sure the Chief Justice knows about it…some things are best left unsaid, sometimes.” Mr. Chandrachud was CJI from 9.9.2022 to 10.11.2024. There were also scores of complaints regarding assigning of politically sensitive cases to a particular judge or benches comprising the same judge. 

His personal conduct has been open to opprobrium. It appears that even though he retired on 10.11.2024, he was staying in the government bungalow till August 2025, a full nine months after and vacated it only after the Supreme Court requested the authorities to evict him. Even more reprehensible were his justifications. First, he tried to justify it on grounds of accessibility concerns for his children with disabilities. Hello, if that be a ground, so many government servants would just occupy their government quarters in perpetuity. Then he asked why the controversy when he was paying market rent. The rules required that he should have vacated it within three months (media reports suggest that he could stay in a lower, type VII quarters for six months while 5, Krishna Menon Marg is type VIII quarters) and since it was a designated bungalow for the CJI, propriety demanded that he should have vacated it on the day of his retirement so that his successor could’ve moved in – even Prime Ministers vacate their designated quarters within a day. Why he has been allotted different government quarters now is not understood. Why he accepted the same is of graver concern. Media not questioning it enough speaks of a circle of silence. 

Post retirement, he has purchased a Mercedes-Benz-E-Class E200 (cost approx. Rs. 92 lacs) and the matter came to light when the registrar of the Supreme Court wrote to Delhi Transport Commissioner requesting a specific registration number for it. Both the cost and that request of the registrar regarding a private vehicle of a private citizen raise eyebrows. It’s also a matter of concern that while annual declaration of assets is mandatory for all government servants, the Supreme Court judges are exempt from it – I feel, they should be leading by example. 

Given the above and the previous blog, I feel, the title of his book, “Why Constitution Matters” is a bit rich. Constitution does matter, but this is not the way to make it so.