File Photo of Supreme Court.
Tax payers have a right to know about the quality of judges, the central government told the Supreme Court today. A five judge constitution bench is hearing hearing arguments on the constitutional validity of the National Judicial Appointment Commission (NJAC) Act.
A tax payer may say that I pay your (judges) salaries, I have a right to know who is going to be a judge," Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the bench headed by Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar.
The NJAC has been set up to replace the two decade-old collegium system of judges appointing judges and widens the process to include the government.
Mr Rohatgi advocated the need for the removal of the current collegium system, "judges appointing judges... for promoting judges who reserved judgments in hundreds of cases after long hearings but never pronounced them".
The bench had observed on Thursday that too much transparency in appointing judges will be "disastrous".
Addressing the court's apprehensions, Mr Rohatgi argued that it may not be necessary to disclose all the information relating to the appointment of judges under NJAC.
Hearing will continue on Monday.