Vice President Jagdeep Dhikar On Thursday, he expressed serious concerns about the increasing dependence of the judiciary Article 142 Of constitution.
The Vice President described Article 142 as a “nuclear missile against democratic forces”, which is “available to the judiciary 24 x 7,” and is said to have a comprehensive review of. Constitutional interpretation Practice in India.
His comment came under the backdrop of recent judicial decisions, directing the President’s action on bills. This came in response to the recent Supreme Court verdict, which set a time limit of three months to the President to decide on the bills forwarded by the state governors.
What is Article 142?
Article 142 of the Constitution gives a grant to the Supreme Court to the widespread discretionary powers so that any order required to ensure “complete justice” in a case can be passed.
This provision allows the apex court to overridge existing laws or fill the legal intervals to resolve the dispute. It can be used to release directions, apply decree, force the production of documents or punish for contempt.
While often seen as a powerful tool to give justice, Article 142 has rapidly criticized some political quarters to enable. Judicial advocate,
Worry about VP Dhankhar
Speaking at the Valdictory ceremony of the Rajya Sabha Internship program, Dhankhar warned against the situation where the judiciary directs the President, questioning the constitutional basis for such rights.
“We may not have a situation where you direct the President of India, and on what basis? Under the Constitution you have the only right to explain the constitution under Article 145 (3),” he said, such an interpretation should come from the Constitution Bench of only five or more judges.
He suggested amending Article 145 (3), which controls the size of the benches to decide sufficient constitutional matters, arguing that the current practice basically dilutes that strength when there were only eight judges in the Supreme Court.
For the use of Article 142, especially, Dhankhar said, “Article 142 has become a nuclear missile against democratic forces, which is available for the judiciary 24X7.”
Tamil Nadu case
The Vice President’s comments came in response to the Supreme Court on 8 April in a case related to the Tamil Nadu government and Governor RN Ravi.
The apex court admitted that once a bill is re -passed by the Legislative Assembly, the governor should accept it and do not reserve it to the President until adequate changes are made.
The ruling by a bench of Justice JB Pardwala and R Mahadevan, asked Article 142 to provide “full justice”, which they had removed all 10 bills from the re -date presented to the governor.
