Lalit Shastri
In the world’s largest democracy, one of its most powerful institutions — the judiciary — is paradoxically governed by one of the most opaque and unaccountable appointment systems: the Collegium. Born not out of constitutional text but judicial invention, the Collegium today functions behind closed doors, shielded from transparency, scrutiny, and public accountability. It is time to discard this archaic arrangement and usher in a National Judicial Service (NJS) — a transparent, merit-based, and democratically anchored alternative that can serve the judiciary and the nation far better.
The Constitution originally envisaged a consultative process where the President would appoint judges after conferring with the Chief Justice of India and other stakeholders. Article 124 provides for consultation but does not grant absolute authority to the judiciary. Yet, through judicial precedents — notably the Second Judges Case (1993) and the Third Judges Case (1998) — the Supreme Court systematically appropriated the power of appointment, crafting the Collegium system that operates today.
What began as a safeguard for judicial independence has mutated into a mechanism rife with opacity, subjectivity, and exclusion. Collegium deliberations remain secret, recommendations lack stated reasons, and selection often hinges less on transparent criteria and more on informal influences within the Bar and Bench. Meritocracy is frequently sacrificed at the altar of proximity, patronage, and familiarity.
Unlike the Collegium system, where selections are often shaped by subjective factors, a National Judicial Service would democratize access to judicial office. Under the current model, it is latent and axiomatic that personal equations between senior members of the judiciary and influential sections of the Bar play a role in the selection process. This injects subjectivity into a process that ought to be rooted solely in merit and constitutional values. Moreover, advocates elevated directly from the Bar typically enter the High Courts at a much younger age — in their mid-40s — giving them a significant seniority advantage over judges elevated from the State Judicial Services, who are often inducted post-55. This structural disparity systematically limits the upward mobility of career judicial officers, irrespective of their merit or experience. A National Judicial Service would correct these imbalances, ensuring early, merit-based induction, professional growth insulated from political and social pressures, and a judiciary that truly reflects the nation’s talent and diversity.
The Collegium system has effectively created a closed, self-selecting oligarchy. Government objections can be overridden through simple reiteration, and the wider public — in whose name justice is rendered — has no role, no voice, and no visibility into how judges who wield enormous power over lives, liberty, and governance are chosen.
The attempt to correct this structural flaw through the 99th Constitutional Amendment, which sought to create the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC), was a step in the right direction but fell victim to judicial anxiety. By striking down the NJAC in 2015, the Supreme Court once again reaffirmed its unchecked monopoly over judicial appointments, citing the need to protect judicial independence. What it refused to acknowledge is that secrecy and monopoly are no guardians of independence; if anything, they breed insularity and arbitrariness.
The answer lies not merely in tweaking the Collegium or reviving a version of NJAC. It lies in a more radical overhaul: the establishment of a National Judicial Service.
An NJS would recruit young legal talent through an open, competitive examination, ensuring entry based on merit, not lineage or networking. It would democratize access to the judiciary, drawing from the broadest pool of talent across the country, across regions, languages, and social backgrounds.
Here it is important to draw a crucial distinction. It would be tempting to compare the NJS with India’s other national services like the IAS, IPS, or IFS, which also recruit through competitive examinations. However, while those services are prestigious, their members often, with few exceptions, become beholden to political executives who control their postings, promotions, and careers. Over time, many bureaucrats, despite their intellectual merit, fall prey to the system of political patronage, becoming instruments, even stooges of those in power.
The National Judicial Service must be categorically different.
Members of the NJS must be steel-jacketed against political interference. Their postings, promotions, and disciplinary matters must be governed by an independent Judicial Services Commission, free from the control of the executive and legislative branches. Once recruited, NJS officers must operate with full decisional autonomy, evaluated only on objective performance metrics — not political loyalty or pliability. Their career progression must be insulated from the day-to-day whims of ministers, chief ministers, or bureaucrats.
At the same time, the system must be inclusive of all streams of legal talent. There should be a structured provision for lateral entry from the Bar, with a fixed quota, to ensure that seasoned and distinguished practicing advocates continue to enrich the judiciary with their litigation experience and legal acumen. Equally important is a clear, merit-based pathway for judges from the State Judicial Services to be inducted into the higher judiciary. These officers, who have served for decades in trial courts and district benches, must not be left behind due to systemic age or seniority disadvantages. Their inclusion would not only correct historical imbalances but also strengthen the institutional memory and ground-level understanding of the justice system.
The proposed National Judicial Commission, tasked with overseeing selection, appointments, performance reviews, and disciplinary matters, should be headed by a serving or retired Supreme Court judge. This will ensure judicial continuity, institutional credibility, and independence from executive or legislative overreach — while upholding the public trust in judicial impartiality.
The Collegium, whatever its historical utility, is now a relic whose defects are too glaring to ignore. Cloistered deliberations, favoritism, disregard for talent from State services, and an utter lack of transparency are realities that cannot be glossed over. Judicial independence is essential — but independence cannot be a fig leaf to protect a fundamentally undemocratic and unaccountable system.
India cannot remain a modern democracy with a medieval appointment system for its judges. The need for a National Judicial Service is not just a matter of administrative reform; it is a matter of constitutional morality and democratic survival.
The time to act is now. India must break free from the shackles of the Collegium and build a judiciary that is independent, accountable, meritocratic, and truly in service of the people.
Only then will the promise of justice in the Constitution — for which generations have struggled and sacrificed — truly find its fullest expression.
The Collegium is democracy’s blind spot. Leaving it unchecked is not judicial independence — it is judicial impunity.
The author, Lalit Shastri, is a senior journalist and legal analyst specializing in constitutional law, governance, and judicial reforms.
This is News 