New Delhi: In a major setback to the UPA government, a united Opposition on Monday stalled the introduction of a controversial bill in Rajya Sabha. The bill seeks declaration of judges' assets without making them public.
Law Minister M Veerappa Moily was forced to defer the Judges (Declaration of Assets and Liabilities) Bill, 2009, after the Opposition, including the BJP and the Left, took exception to Clause VI of the Bill which states that High Court and Supreme Court judges would declare their assets but the same would not be made public.
After failing to muster support of the Opposition and sensing the mood of the House, including the Congress members, Moily said "it (introduction of the Bill) is deferred."
Opposition to a Bill at the introduction stage itself is a rare phenomenon and it prompted Deputy Chairman K Rahman Khan to cite an earlier ruling and seek the opinion of the House.
The Congress has to go by consensus as in the 245-member Upper House, the party and its allies have a strength of 79.
At present, there is only an internal mechanism created by the Supreme Court on the declaration of assets by judges.
"There is no law (to deal with the issue)," he said adding "we found a lot of corruption in many places in judiciary. We need to deal with that."
Observing that the government can hardly do anything with regard to corruption cases in judiciary, Moily said judges could not even be impeached. Only one case is pending for which the Rajya Sabha Chairman has constituted a committee to look into the issue.
He said the government proposes to bring a comprehensive judges enquiry bill that will deal with the issue of corruption on a much wider scale. "We are working on a roadmap on judicial reforms," he said, adding national consultation would be held later this month.
Making a demand for reference of the bill to the Parliamentary Standing Committee, Jayanthi Natrajan (Cong) said it might be violative of the Right to Information Act.
Noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani said the bill violated the basic feature of the Constitution. He described it as "conspiracy in corruption" and said the government was destroying the independence of judiciary by giving them a favour. "It creates suspicion that judiciary is seeking favour."
D Raja (CPI) said the proposed legislation cannot be accepted and nobody was above the law.