Bid to control judiciary always existed: Justice Chelameswar

Former Judge of Supreme Court, Justice J Chelameswar on Thursday said an attempt to regulate or have control over the judicial system always existed in democracy and to check such a trend the collegium system came into being.

The retired judge, who was among the four judges of the apex court to come out in the open last year and list out problems in the country's top court said such an effort from the side of the executive arm of the government had always been there.

"The eternal attempt of the executive to regulate or to have control over the judicial system; it always existed in democracy in some form or the other," he said addressing a lecture here.

On quite a few occasions, such attempts have been successful, he noted.

The former Judge addressed a lecture on "Judiciary at cross-roads," held by the Triplicane Cultural Academy and The Kasturi Srinivasan Library here.

The effort has always been there, in any country, he said and cited an example from America to ...