NEW DELHI, March 24 -- Amid cash discovery row following a fire at a Delhi High Court judge, Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar on Monday held a meeting with Leader of the House J P Nadda and Leader of the Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge for a structured discussion in the Upper House on the issue of judicial accountability and the NJAC Act.

In the Lok Sabha Trinamool Congress member Mahua Moitra, during her speech on the Finance Bill, said the government and its "godi media" are laying the ground for doing away with the Collegium system in favour of NJAC type total government control over judicial appointments, much like Election Commission's de-fanging.

Nadda and Kharge held closed-door consultations with Dhankhar in his chamber.

The Rajya Sabha chairman had earlier written to both Nadda and Kharge for the meeting. The meeting was held in reference to the observations Dhankhar made in the House on March 21 while responding to the points raised by Congress leader Jairam Ramesh over the recovery of cash from the residence of a high court judge.

Dhankhar had referred to the mechanism for judicial appointments after the passage of the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) Act in 2014. The legislation was struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional later.

He had told the Rajya Sabha, "You all will recollect the mechanism which was passed by this House with near unanimity, with no dissension, only one abstention in the Rajya Sabha, all political parties converging and going in for the initiative of the government." "I wish to find out the status of that which emanated from Indian Parliament made sacrosanct by the endorsement of 16 state assemblies in the country and signed by the Hon'ble President under article 111 of the Constitution," he had said.

"That historic legislation endorsed by this Parliament with unprecedented consensual support unknown to the parliamentary history of this country dealt with the malaise very severely. If the malaise had been dealt with perhaps we would not have countenanced such kind of issues. What bothers me is that the incident happened and did not immediately surface," the chairman had further observed.

The current Collegium system has often come under fire for lacking transparency by politicians and some eminent jurists, who contend that judges appointing judges without any say of the Executive has led to complaints of nepotism and favouritism.

Under the Collegium system, which came into existence in 1993 after a Supreme Court judgement, five top judges of the apex court recommend the appointment, transfer and elevation of judges to the Supreme Court and the 25 high courts.

The government can return the recommendation to the Collegium under this system. It usually accepts the recommendation if it is reiterated by the Collegium. But there have been cases when the government has returned the file again or has not responded to the recommendations.

Successive CJIs have defended the system saying it has stood the test of time and was working without any hitches.

Under the now-struck-down law, the Chief Justice of India was to head the NJAC. Besides the CJI, the judiciary was to be represented by two senior judges of the Supreme Court. Two eminent personalities and the law minister were to be the other members of the body. The prominent people, one of whom will belong to either of SC/ST, OBC, minorities or a woman, were to be selected by a panel of Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and the leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha or the leader of the largest opposition party in the Lower House.

The body was tasked to shortlist candidates to be appointed as SC and HC judges who were to be appointed by the President of India. The critics of the law had maintained that it would hamper the independence of Judiciary.

A government bungalow at Purana Quila Road was allocated to the NJC to set up a secretariat.

On October 16, 2015, the top court struck down the law describing it as unconstitutional. The decision revived the Collegium system.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.