Q.Why is independence of the judiciary important? Should executive have power to appoint judges? What changes would you suggest to the appointment procedure?
Independence of the judiciary matters because only a judiciary free of political pressure can rule against the powerful exactly as it would rule against an ordinary citizen; giving the executive sole power to appoint judges risks undermining exactly that, which is why India's system has moved toward a more collegial appointment process instead.
Judiciary independence is important because the judiciary's core job — protecting individual rights, settling disputes according to law, and preventing democracy from collapsing into the dictatorship of one group — is only possible if judges can rule "without fear or favour." A judge who owes their appointment, and their continued favour, entirely to the executive has an obvious incentive to avoid rulings that displease the government of the day, especially in cases that directly involve the government as a party.
Should the executive have the power to appoint judges? Giving the executive sole, unchecked power to appoint judges is risky for exactly this reason — and India's own constitutional history illustrates the risk concretely: the convention of appointing the senior-most judge as Chief Justice of India was broken twice, in 1973 and 1975, in ways widely read as the executive rewarding judges seen as sympathetic to it. That history is precisely why the Supreme Court itself, between 1982 and 1998, moved the process away from executive discretion and toward a collegial system, where the CJI recommends names in consultation with the four senior-most judges of the Court.
What changes would help? Building on that same logic, a genuinely balanced appointment procedure should keep the final decision from resting with any single actor — whether that is the executive alone or the judiciary alone. A transparent process that combines judicial input (to protect against purely political appointments) with a check from outside the judiciary (so the judiciary is not simply a self-perpetuating body either) would guard against both risks at once — favouring judicial independence without letting the judiciary become entirely unaccountable to anyone outside itself.
Independence matters because it lets judges rule against even the government of the day without fear of retaliation, which is essential to protecting rights and settling disputes fairly. Giving the executive unchecked appointment power risks compromising that — as shown when the CJI convention was broken twice (1973, 1975) in ways read as rewarding pliant judges — which is exactly why India moved toward the collegial system. A transparent process balancing judicial input with an outside check (rather than leaving the final say entirely with either the executive or the judiciary alone) would best protect independence while keeping the judiciary answerable to more than just itself.
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