Indian Express: New Delhi: Monday, July 02, 2018.
Of the 23
judges presently in the Supreme Court, from a sanctioned strength of 31, only
12 have disclosed their assets on the official website. According to the
Supreme Court website, the 11 judges who are yet to disclose their assets and
investments include Justices R F Nariman, A M Sapre, U U Lalit, D Y
Chandrachud, L Nageswara Rao, Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Mohan M Shantanagoudar, S
Abdul Nazeer, Navin Sinha, Deepak Gupta and Indu Malhotra. Justices Nariman,
Lalit, Rao and Malhotra were elevated directly from the Bar.
Justice
Malhotra took office in April while five others Justices Kaul, Shantanagoudar,
Nazeer, Sinha and Gupta were elevated one-and-a-half years ago. Justices
Chandrachud and Rao were elevated more than two years ago. Justices Nariman,
Sapre and Lalit came to the Supreme Court four years ago.
Those who
have disclosed their assets include the Chief Justice of India and the other
four judges in the Collegium, and seven others. The website shows that as
recently as June 6, 2018, Justice Ranjan Gogoi, the most senior judge after the
CJI, updated his assets recording the sale of land held by him in Guwahati for
Rs 65 lakh, even the tax deducted at source, as well as the transfer of
ancestral land gifted to him and his spouse by his mother.
According to
the website, all the judges, who have declared their assets, own some land. It
shows that the top two judges don’t own a car. Justice Madan B Lokur owns a
Maruti Swift, Justice Kurian Joseph a second-hand Maruti Esteem and Justice A K
Sikri a Honda Civic, the website shows.
The Supreme
Court website also retains records of assets of 44 former judges of the court,
taking the total number of declarations to 56 judges. In May 1997, the Supreme
Court decreed in a full court resolution that all judges must disclose details
of assets and investments, alongwith that of their spouses and dependents, to
the Chief Justice. The declarations would be confidential, it said.
The
resolution stated: “Every Judge should make a declaration of all his/her assets
in the form of real estate or investments (held by him/her in his/her own name
or in the name of his/her spouse or any person dependent on him/her) within a
reasonable time of assuming office and in the case of sitting Judges within a
reasonable time of adoption of this Resolution and thereafter whenever any
acquisition of a substantial nature is made, it shall be disclosed within a
reasonable time. The declaration so made should be to the Chief Justice of the
Court. The Chief Justice should make a similar declaration for the purpose of
the record.”
In 2007, a
petitioner approached the Delhi High Court asking for disclosure of assets by
Judges under the Right to Information (RTI) Act. The Supreme Court registry
contested this plea but a three-judge bench ruled that judges should declare
the assets. The registry did not appeal the High Court decision. On August 26,
2009, the Supreme Court said in a full court meeting, with Justice K G
Balakrishnan as the Chief Justice, that it would voluntarily declare assets,
which would be made public.
The
declaration of assets is not according to a prescribed format or method. There
is no recording of assets before or after the Supreme Court tenure. Yet, their
public declaration is seen as a signal of transparency and a measure to
increase confidence in the system, especially as judges appoint their own after
the National Judicial Appointments Commission was struck down in 2015 by the
Supreme Court.
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