The most contentious element of the reform would overhaul the selection committee which appoints judges — the existing system has a nine-member committee made up of judges, ministers, and members of the bar association.
Author
Khinvraj Jangid, Associate Professor & Director of Jindal Center for Israel Studies, Jindal School of International Affairs, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, Haryana, India.
Summary
Israel has been seeing an intense and large-scale people’s resistance for the last three months over the issue of how independent the judiciary should remain in a democracy. Lakhs of Israelis have been protesting against the Netanyahu government every week in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and in over a hundred other cities. Israel is a small country with just nine million (90 lakh) people – yet, it is experiencing one of the most well-sustained and peacefully-organised protests in the name of democracy in recent memory. The issue of judicial reform concerns not only the political class but also much broader sections of society. Independent women’s organisations, academicians and universities, lawyers, doctors, industrialists, and entrepreneurs, tech companies, intelligence and national security heads, soldiers and high-ranking officials of the Israeli army have all taken part in debating whether Israel’s democracy is threatened by legal excesses or political intrusions into the judicial system. This debate is relevant to India, too.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formed the government with a clear majority in December last year and in the very first month of the new administration, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice, Yariv Levin, introduced a judicial reform bill in parliament.
The bill proposed to balance the power between the executive and judiciary so that the democratically-elected government is not constrained by the courts. People’s will would be expressed through the elected legislature and courts would not intervene in law-making by striking down laws passed by the legislature.
The most contentious element of the reform would overhaul the selection committee which appoints judges — the existing system has a nine-member committee made up of judges, ministers, and members of the bar association. Netanyahu’s legal team proposed a new committee, that would give more powers to the government in selecting the judges. The key thrust of the reform is that judges shall not appoint judges.
Published in: The Indian Express
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