Montesquieu will toss and turn in his grave….

Yesterday Somnath Chatterjee delivered the the Dr Kailash Nath Katju Memorial Lecture on Separation of Powers under the Constitution and Judicial Activism.

I quote a part of his lecture since he has so succinctly compiled all the instances of mindless activism.

“The Honourable High Court of Delhi in recent times dealt with subjects ranging from age and other criteria for nursery admissions, unauthorised schools, criteria for free seats in schools, supply of drinking water in schools, number of free beds in hospitals on public land, use and misuse of ambulances, requirements for establishing a world class burns ward in a hospital, the kind of air Delhiites breathe, begging in public, use of sub-ways, the nature of buses we board, the legality of constructions in Delhi, identifying the buildings to be demolished, the size of speed breakers on Delhi roads, auto rickshaw overcharging, growing frequency of Delhi road accidents and enhancing road fines.”

The common argument in favour of such activist courts is that the executive has been inefficient, thus forcing the judiciary to enter the executive domain and create a command and control system, for the sake of the common man.

One question though. Does the executive ever say that the judiciary has been inefficient and there are cases pending over twenty years and hence government departments must take over the disposal of these pending cases? And if they did, what would happen?

PS. My favourite one is the size of speedbreakers on Delhi roads.