The Indian judiciary has long enjoyed a reputation of honesty, especially compared to politicians. This impression exists in parallel to the fact that Indians are terrified of actually going to court, given the low expectation of honest justice from the judicial system.
This paradox is slowly crumbling with recent accusations of corruption against judges. On March 14, for instance, wads of unaccounted cash were allegedly discovered at the house of a Delhi High Court judge, Yashwant Varma.
Till now, the judiciary had shielded itself from corruption investigations. But in the wake of the Verma controversy, judges are scrambling to manage public perception of themselves. On April 3, the Supreme Court reportedly decided that judges of the Supreme Court will soon publicly declare their assets on the court’s website. However, no official confirmation has been made yet.
Judges enjoy a unique status within the Indian state: unlike other holders of public office, Supreme Court and High Court judges are not required to publicly declare their assets.
If all Supreme Court judges end up disclosing their assets, it will mark the fruition of a push towards transparency that began 28 years ago. The fact that the Indian judiciary has not been able to achieve a matter as simple as declaring their assets underlines how opaque it has been when it comes to battling internal corruption.
Incremental transparency
In 1997, the full court of the Supreme Court first decided that on being appointed to the highest court, a judge must declare their assets to the chief justice of India. Details should include ownership of real estate or investments by the judge or their spouse or their dependent family members. They must also share with the chief justice “any acquisition of a substantial nature”.
Most High Courts adopted similar resolutions soon after, committing that judges will share their assets with the chief justice of the High Court.
These resolutions were clear, though, that the declarations made to the chief justice would be “confidential” – that is, the judges’ assets would not be made public.
However, in August 2009, another full court resolution of the Supreme Court changed this: asset declarations by Supreme Court judges were to be made public – but voluntarily. Within a few days, similar resolutions were adopted by the High Courts of Delhi, Madras, Punjab and Haryana, Kerala, Bombay, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan.
Later that year, the Union Law Minister at that time, M. Veerappa Moily attempted to introduce a bill in Parliament to mandate the periodic declaration of assets and liabilities by all High Court judges, along with those of their spouses and dependent children, to the chief justice of that High Court. The chief justices, in turn, along with Supreme Court judges, were to make similar declarations to the Chief Justice of India.
But it could not be passed because opposition by MPs were not satisifed with internal disclosures within the judiciary: they wanted judges’ assets to be made public. They also opposed provisions that insulated judges from any inquiries on the basis of their declarations.
Stalled progress
However, the 2009 Supreme Court judgement had little effect: currently, none of the Supreme Court judges have voluntarily published their assets. As per the Supreme Court website, 30 of the 33 judges on its bench have declared their assets to Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna. (Khanna has also made such a disclosure.) This means that the three remaining judges – Justices N Kotiswar Singh, K Vinod Chandra and Joymalya Bagchi – have seemingly not even followed the 1997 resolution of the apex court.
Among the High Courts, data from 2021 onwards has consistently shown that only 12%-14% of all High Court judges have volunteered to publish their assets on High Court websites. None of the High Courts indicate how many of the judges have declared their assets to the chief justice of the High Court.
The Indian Express reported that in response to applications under the Right to Information Act in 2023, the High Courts of Andhra Pradesh, Allahabad, Bombay, Gujarat, Telangana and Uttarakhand said that such information was confidential and could not be made public.
The High Courts of Gauhati and Rajasthan had said that that there is no mandatory rule or Supreme Court directive requiring judges' asset declarations to be published on the High Court websites.
This refusal by the High Courts was in violation of the position laid by the Supreme Court in 2019. A Constitution bench of the court held in a judgement that whether judges had declared their assets to the chief justice of their court could be sought under the Right to Information Act. However, information about the actual assets of specific judges would come within the “personal information” exemption under the act, unless “larger public interest” justifies the disclosure of the information.
In 2023, a Parliamentary Standing Committee had, in a report on “Judicial Processes and their reform”, recommended legislative changes to mandate annual asset declarations by all Supreme Court and High Court judges to an appropriate authority, preferably also making them public.
However, the Supreme Court has resisted accepting these recommendations. In reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha in March, the Union Law Minister Arjun Meghal told Parliament that the Supreme Court constituted a committee of its judges to examine the Parliamentary Standing Committee’s report.
The judges’ committee concluded that, according to the Supreme Court’s 2019 judgement, information regarding judges’ assets was already covered by the Right to Information Act. However, it ignored the Parliamentary Standing Committee’s recommendation of declaration of judges’ assets to an appropriate authority.
Norm for other officials
Ironically, even as it has protected itself, the judiciary has pushed hard when it comes to transparency for other state officials. The Supreme Court has held in several judgements that citizens possess the fundamental right to know, under Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution, about the assets and liabilities of candidates contesting legislative elections.
Detailed asset declarations by all candidates in Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections are published by the Election Commission of India on its website.
Most government officials are required to annually share asset declarations with vigilance authorities as well. Information about these declarations is usually available to citizens under the Right to Information Act. The assets of union ministers are periodically published on the website of the Prime Minister’s Office.
