New Delhi : A day after Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley found fault with the Supreme Court’s reasoning for striking down the NJAC Act, the Congress has said that instead of insulting the highest judiciary, he should focus more on his responsibility as the country’s finance minister, considering the bad state of the economy.
In a media interaction, former union minister and party spokesperson Anand Sharma observed that in the last 16 months since the advent of the Narendra Modi dispensation, there has been “systematic assault on the autonomy of institutions and rewriting of rules”.
He added that it was “very wrong” for Jaitley to say that the judiciary acted like “the third chamber of the legislature” while quashing the Act to establish the National Judicial Appointment Commission (NJAC) for appointment of judges.
He pointed out that after the apex court had assured the parliament and the political leadership that their concerns on the collegium system will be heard with a view to bring reforms and transparency, there was no need for the finance minister to make such observations.
“In the light of the changed situation, (our advice is) Jaitley, who is a senior advocate, will not to embark on a path of confrontation…not healthy for democracy,” he added.
The Congress criticism of the BJP also extended to the issue of communal polarisation and the BJP president Amit Shah’s reported to advice to his party colleagues to observe restraint. “One does not know what to make of these reports. It may alright for the BJP president Amit Shah to admonish his colleagues, but our concern is different. Who would admonish the BJP president or the union finance minister or for that matter the prime minister himself,” said another party spokesperson Shakeel Ahmed.
