Still hanging fire on transparency

Courts need to go beyond appealing to the fictional conscience of our lawmakers

In a recent judgment, a Supreme Court Bench headed by Justice Rohinton F. Nariman fined eight political parties for being in contempt of the Court’s directions to inform citizens about the criminal antecedents of their candidates. In 2004, 24% of the Members of Parliament had criminal cases pending against them. This figure rose to an alarming 43% after the 2019 general elections. In a bid to address this “malignancy” of criminalisation which could be “fatal to democracy”, the apex court, in a series of judgments, had directed political parties to declare and widely publicise not just the criminal antecedents of candidates, but also inform the electorate why these candidates were found to be more suitable by the party than those without criminal backgrounds. Anticipating that parties would cite ‘winnability’ as the criterion, the Court clarified that the reasons for selection shall be with reference to the qualifications, achievements and merit of the candidate concerned. Despite these clear directives, parties have been defiant. This is not the first instance where political parties have shown total contempt for peoples’ right to information. Acting in exemplary unison, after the judgment in Union of India v. ADR (2002), wherein all candidates standing for elections were directed to file an affidavit declaring their educational, financial and criminal backgrounds, political parties amended the Representation of the People Act, 1951, to nullify the disclosure requirements. The Court struck down the amendments.