UPA's judicial reforms to get BJP backing

If the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is keen to usher in comprehensive judicial reforms over the next five years, the Opposition is even more willing to extend its support in Parliament and is eager to see reforms in the contentious area of appointments and accountability of the judiciary.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders have hailed M Veerappa Moily’s announcement after taking over as the Union law and justice minister that the next five years will be an era of judicial reforms. The party’s legal hands, including former ministers, said that the BJP was willing to go the extra mile to cooperate with the government in ushering in the much-delayed judicial reforms.

“Last five years of the UPA saw no movement on legal and judicial reforms which the National Democratic Alliance had started,” said a senior BJP leader.

According to Arun Jaitley, BJP’s leader in the Rajya Sabha and a former Union law minister, there is a scope for wide-ranging reforms in the system including the appointment of judges. “It’s time to even regulate the discretion of the collegium that appoints the judges in the high courts,” he said.

The UPA will have to tackle some basic issues like delayed justice, an abysmally skewed judge-population ratio (one judge for one million people), and slow disposal of cases.

Prime Minister himself Manmohan Singh himself had said during the election campaign that judicial reforms would be his first priority if the UPA came back to power.

BJP sources said some of its top legal heads were already engaged with civil society groups which were working on making specific recommendations on judicial reforms. ''We will be happy to lend a helping hand to the government on this front,’’ sources said.

Moily, who, as head of the Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC) had given wide-ranging recommendation on administrative changes required in all spheres, said "the next five years will be the era of judicial reforms...We have to ensure that the rule of law is for every individual..the 'aam admi'."

He had also said that judicial reforms could not be partial or fragmented. ''We need holistic reforms," he said.