The court has directed that the reinstated CBI chief must desist from taking any major policy decisions till the selection committee, comprising the Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and Leader of Opposition, meets within a week’s time.The setting aside by the Supreme Court of the government’s midnight orders three months ago, that divested CBI chief Alok Kumar Verma of his powers and sent him on forced leave, is a reassuring moment. By reinstating Verma, and by laying down that the government could not have taken the decision to transfer the CBI chief without the prior consent of the high-powered committee tasked with his appointment, and by reading “transfer” as encompassing all acts that affect the independent functioning of the CBI director, the apex court sends out at least three welcome messages at once. One, it rebukes the government for trying to short circuit due process and procedure; two, it serves up a reminder that the status of the CBI as the premier investigating and prosecuting agency, and public confidence in it, depend on its freedom to act without fear and favour which, in turn, comes from its insulation from “extraneous influence”. That insulation flows from the legislative intent in statutory enactments such as the CVC Act of 2003 and the (amended) Delhi Special Police Establishment Act of 1946, and the court’s own directives in the seminal Vineet Narain case. Three, the unanimous three-judge bench decision underlines that the rule of law is the “bedrock of democracy” and that “however firmly entrenched the principle may be, it gets tested in a myriad of situations that confront the courts from time to time”. The present case is one such occasion, it says.
The court has directed that the reinstated CBI chief must desist from taking any major policy decisions till the selection committee, comprising the Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and Leader of Opposition, meets within a week’s time. But that is not the only caution or firewall, going ahead. The government must know that it cannot interfere with the CBI’s functioning, using the CBI’s internal mess as a pretext, or the Central Vigilance Commission as cover, and get away with it. While the swapping of corruption charges in the public domain by the two senior-most officers of the CBI had presented an unseemly spectacle, the government’s arbitrary and heavy-footed intervention made matters worse. It revived concerns that a political executive armed with a decisive majority is not mindful or respectful enough of the need to protect and nurture the autonomy of unelected institutions. And that it needed to be reminded — as the court has done in this case — of the governing principle of a constitutional democracy: “Be you ever so high, the law is above you”.
The court has set the bar. Now it is up to future CBI directors to use it as a shield and as a touchstone for their own conduct, remain vigilant against any attempts to encroach on their institutional autonomy. And for governments to read the warning on the wall against any overreach.
