NEW DELHI: Hours after President Droupadi Murmu appointed former apex court judge S Abdul Nazeer as the governor of Andhra Pradesh, Congress and BJP traded charges, with the former calling the appointment a “threat” to the independence of the judiciary, and the latter pointing to past precedents.
In a bid to embarrass the saffron party, Congress communications chief Jairam Ramesh posted on Twitter a speech of former Union minister and BJP MP Arun Jaitley in Parliament where he said that “the desire of a post-retirement job, influences pre-retirement judgments (and) it’s a threat to the independence of the judiciary.”
BJP chief spokesperson Anil Baluni, however, said this was not the first time that a retired Supreme Court judge has been given gubernatorial or another constitutional responsibility after superannuation. “There are no restrictions on appointment of a retired judge to a constitutional office after retirement. There have been several examples in the past too,” Baluni said.
Congress MP Abhishek Singhvi, however, dismissed the argument that such appointments should be condoned only because they had been done before. “We are not talking about persons or individuals. Personally, I have very great respect for this person (Nazeer). As a matter of principle we oppose it. We believe it is a matter of great diminution and a great threat to the independence of the judiciary,” Singhvi said, referring to Jaitley’s remarks.
Union law minister Kiren Rijiju said the “whole ecosystem” is once again in “full swing” over the issue. They should better understand that they can no longer treat India as their “personal fiefdom”, the minister said, without naming anyone. Taking to Twitter, Rijiju said India will be guided by the provisions of the Constitution.