FACE TO FACE
FEBRUARY 22
Singh is also a founder member of Nepal-Bharat Friendship Society and Vice-president of Mahamana Malviya Mission, Nepal.
Ram Kumar Kamat of The Himalayan Times had a tête-à-tête with Singh on constitutional and contemporary laws. Excerpts:
What are the issues of independence of judiciary under the new constitution?
First of all, there should be no adhocism in the judiciary. At present, we have Acting Chief Justice and six out of seven Chief Judges of the high courts are Acting Chief Judges. This is bad for the independence of judiciary. Unless the Justices are permanent, they cannot work independently.
Apart from this, the current process whereby the judges of the Supreme Court and other courts are appointed also needs a review. Under the current provision, representatives of Nepal Bar Association and Minister of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs also have their roles in the appointment of judges.
India has a collegium system where judges are in the majority to appoint judges and I think similar system would be better for our country to appoint judges. Judges are the best persons to ascertain the qualities of the candidates for judges. There should be no political interference in the appointment of judges. It is because of the fair judge's appointment process in India we do not hear that the judges have any political influence in their daily work of adjudication of cases. The judiciary faces challenge of restoring faith in the people that it is cathedral of justice.
In the past, judiciary faced allegation of corruption and anomalies.
Ever since the judiciary adopted lottery-based cause list, things have improved for better. Ultimately, we need to go for automation-based cause list. Let's hope that our judiciary adopts automation-based cause list soon.
Judges also face criticism that sometimes they fail to deliver enlightened verdicts in some cases. What do you have to say on that?
Judges should also be provided training opportunities particularly refresher's course so that they will have an opportunity to know the current trend in the jurisprudence and adjudication cases. Judges should be sent abroad to study the adjudication of cases in developed world. Only then can we expect our judges to meet the challenges of our times. The government should provide new legal books to judges to enable them to be acquainted with the evolving principles of jurisprudence.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal send community school teachers to the United Kingdom for training and that has shown good results in Delhi schools. Now that the trained teachers are able to handle the challenge of quality education, many parents who were inclined to send their kids to private schools for quality education have begun to send their kids to community schools.
People are saying that the current electoral system is faulty because no single party can easily win simple majority in the House of Representatives. Do you think that the constitution needs to be revised in order to ensure political stability?
There are some issues for which we need to amend the constitution. Amendment to the constitution is a natural course of action to address people's aspirations. Our constitution stipulates that there cannot be more than 25 ministers, including the prime minister in the federal capital but it does not fix any limitation for the strength of provincial governments. It's high time we also considered fixing the limit of the provincial governments' strength. In my personal view, the constitution can be amended to ensure that there are no more than 11 members in the provincial cabinet. The current constitution stipulates that provincial executives can have members up to 20 per cent of the concerned provincial assemblies. In the case of federal executive, the constitution allows only nine per cent of the HoR to be the members of the Cabinet whereas in the case of provincial governments, there can be up to 20 per cent members in the Cabinet. I hear argument that the electoral system is faulty. Some even call for fully proportional system. I think the current electoral system is better because it ensures representation under both the system - first-past-the-post electoral system (60 per cent) and proportional representation system (40 per cent). Parties need to develop coalition culture to make the new constitution successful. In India, the ruling parties have successfully run coalition government for the past many years and not even the Indian National Congress want mid-term polls there. As far as the demands for fully proportional election is concerned, none of the countries of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries have such provision. The current mixed election system is better because under the fully proportional election system the candidates will not have to present their report card and thus, they could escape accountability. There should be committee to work on the issues of constitutional amendments. Other countries have it and we can also have such a committee to identify the issues of constitutional amendments.
People are questioning federalism arguing that it is an expensive system. What do you have to say on this?
There are 26 federal countries in the world and within South Asia there are three federal countries - Nepal, India and Pakistan. Forty-six per cent of the world's population live in federal countries. None of the federal countries have reversed federalism. All kinds of countries - large and small - have adopted federal system. India, the world's second largest country in terms of population, and Palau which is a tiny island nation near the Philippines with 18,024 population are also federal countries. India and Pakistan have their share of political problems but nobody said that federalism was bad for their country. In our country, it is bizarre that people have started raising questions against the federal system. Even some government ministers are speaking against federalism.
What legal approaches do you suggest for the economic progress of a country?
Liberalisation, decentralisation and globalisation are the three basic mantras for the overall development of any country. In the current age, any country that fails to attract enough direct investment cannot achieve the goals of development and prosperity. Nepal's communist forces are basically a socialist force but they have not dropped communist name from their parties. We have seen even communist leaders' children and communist jurists tend to migrate to the United States of America where a member of communist party is barred by law from becoming a naturalised citizen of that country. When the communist parties act like a socialist force, they should not keep communist name in their parties' names. Italy offers a very good example. Communist parties of Italy do not have hammer and sickle as their election symbol. They have adopted socialist names. I think communist parties of Nepal could emulate them because that will give the international community a good reason to believe that they will abide by the democratic rules. Unless the foreign investors feel confidence in our system, unless they have reason to believe that their investment are secure, they won't bring huge amount of investment into our country. Desired reforms should be introduced in our legal system to attract enough FDI into Nepal. The constitution says that we are a public welfare country but in practice we are becoming a farewell country because every day at least 1,500 people aspiring to go to foreign country for employment obtain their passports. Policymakers need to think how we can fulfil the constitutional pledge of transforming the country into a public welfare country.
Singapore is a tiny country which does not have its own resources. Still, it became a prosperous country in a short span of time. Today, Singapore exports four times more goods than that of India. Lee Kuwan Yeu's honest efforts to build Singapore made the country a prosperous one within a short span of time. When Lee was asked of the key to Singapore's economic success, he said that he educated his fellow citizens and they built the nation. We can also achieve economic progress within a short span of time but for that to happen, our leaders need to work honestly. Unfortunately, we have more agitators than leaders.
A version of this article appears in the print on February 23, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.
