An Appeal to Members of the Bar and the Litigant Public on the 79th Independence Day
Mathews J. Nedumpara
President
National Lawyers Campaign for Judicial Transparency and Reforms
98205 35428
15th August 2025
An Appeal to Members of the Bar and the Litigant Public on the 79th Independence Day
(1) Our political executive and legislature are primarily responsible for the ills plaguing our justice delivery system today. It is not that they have acted wrongly, but rather that their persistent inaction has caused this decline. In a democracy, governance is the exclusive province of the legislature and the executive, yet they have allowed the courts to usurp their role.
(2) The future Parliaments—whom the Constituent Assembly once regarded with reverence as being truly more representative than themselves—have today been reduced to the status of a subordinate tribunal. What a pity! Judges now rule this country through self-serving judgments. They appoint themselves, using the so-called “PILs” and suo motu powers, akin to relator actions or qui tam proceedings in English law.
(3) They have subjugated the Bar by dividing it into different classes. The Fourth Estate, too, has largely failed in discharging its duty to the people, just as the political leadership has. All this—something our founding fathers could never have imagined—has been made possible by vested interests: a few dynasties of lawyers and judges who chant the mantra of the “basic structure” of the Constitution.
(4) All law officers, without exception since the days of Indira Gandhi, have been complicit in this subjugation of Parliament. The only man who has spoken valiantly against this hijacking of the constitutional scheme in recent times is our former Vice-President, Jagdeep Dhankhar.
(5) Kapil Sibal, A.M. Singhvi, Prashant Bhushan, and other armchair politicians have perpetuated this state of affairs for decades, unchallenged. Innocent souls like Ashwini Upadhyay have been abusing the so-called PIL jurisprudence at the cost of ordinary litigants who approach the Supreme Court seeking justice. The Court’s precious time is squandered on “fancy” PILs concerning Article 370, Electoral Bonds, Sabarimala, the selection of Election Commissioners, and similar matters.
(6) Judges have usurped the power to appoint judges. Figures like Sibal and Bhushan openly demand that the judiciary be part of the executive—not only in judicial appointments but also in the appointment of Election Commissioners, CBI Directors, and members of various tribunals. They speak shamelessly, in defiance of first principles.
(7) The average time for hearing an SLP—cases involving the life, liberty, and property of common litigants—is a mere 93 seconds. With the constitution of five-judge and seven-judge benches to hear such “fancy” PILs, even those 93 seconds will shrink further. SLPs are dismissed with one-line orders, and 99% of review petitions are rejected in chambers.
(8) The Supreme Court has failed the common litigant. Its time is monopolized by PILs and the elite—Kapil Sibals, Singhvis, Rohatgis, Prashant Bhushans, and their ilk. We cannot allow this state of affairs to continue. Political leaders today are advised by Sibals, Singhvis, Rohatgis, Venugopals, and others like them.
(9) It is high time that we, ordinary lawyers and litigants, meet the political executive and apprise them of the true state of affairs. I know for certain that, by this write-up, I will attract the hostility of the elite lobby, but I have no choice except to do so in my pursuit of the rights of the 99% of the Bar and the litigant public who are denied justice and fair treatment at the Temples of Justice.
(10) I will be in Delhi on the 21st and 22nd of this month. We need to meet political leaders. I request one and all to join me.
Mathews J. Nedumpara
98205 35428 / 94471 65651 / 94471