Guarding the guardians from manufactured distrust

In recent weeks, India’s judiciary has found itself drawn into an unusual public controversy, not through its judgements, but through conversations taking place outside the courtroom. Former law officers, government advisers and public commentators have begun portraying the courts as opaque, unaccountable, and self-insulating. What may appear as civic candour risks becoming something more insidious: a narrative campaign to erode the moral legitimacy of the institution that stands between citizen and State.

In a recent interview with journalist Arnab Goswami, Senior Advocate Harish Salve mounted a sharp critique of the judiciary. He questioned the Supreme Court’s handling of the Justice Varma episode, asking why then Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna did not direct a criminal probe and instead dealt with the matter administratively. Yet Justice Khanna acted squarely within the in-house procedure laid down by the Court, following the law in both letter and spirit. The issue has since received judicial quietus in XXX vs Union of India (2025), where the Court upheld the Chief Justice’s decision as constitutionally proper. 

Salve also took aim at the collegium system, calling it opaque and outdated, and suggesting that no other democracy allows “judges to appoint judges”. This argument was considered and decisively rejected by the Constitution Bench in the National Judicial Appointments Commission judgement (2015), which observed, “The Constitution of India has its own background and personality. Therefore, models of other countries could not be blindly followed so as to damage the identity and personality of our Constitution.” To revive this debate through televised soundbites risks flattening a constitutional dialogue into populist critique.

The interview also touched upon former Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud’s recent interaction with the BBC, which both Salve and the host termed reflective of a ‘colonial mindset’. The suggestion that speaking to a British journalist undermines national dignity borders on the parochial. The medium cannot taint the message. Judges, like all constitutional actors, retain freedom of expression. To presume impropriety in dialogue is to mistake silence for virtue and transparency for transgression.

Not long ago, the Union government’s economic adviser, Sanjeev Sanyal, criticised the judiciary for its “My Lord culture”, long vacations, and alleged inefficiency. What may sound like concern over judicial delay – a genuine problem in a country weighed down by pendency – takes on a different hue when voiced by a senior government official. It reads less as critique and more as derision, a slow erosion of institutional dignity. Seen alongside similar remarks from former law officers, it suggests a broader effort to normalise distrust and weaken faith in the judiciary. 

As Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War, “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” The same strategy is unfolding today: not through confrontation, but corrosion --persuading citizens that the institution meant to protect them has failed and that only a “new order” can restore
justice. Power, he observed, triumphs first in perception before it does on the battlefield. In politics too, institutions are seldom dismantled by force; they are hollowed
out by doubt.

The recent spate of attacks on the judiciary, wrapped in the language of reform, reflects this ancient strategy. When those once entrusted with defending the institution begin portraying it as corrupt or unaccountable, the battle for legitimacy is already half lost. 

This war of perception poses a grave threat to constitutional democracy. Once the judiciary is seen as part of the problem rather than the guarantor of solutions, power tilts dangerously toward the executive. The Court’s strength rests on faith; if that belief is undermined, even the strongest judgements will be drowned out by orchestrated outrage.

History and literature remind us that empires seldom fall by conquest, but by belief. In George R R Martin’s Game of Thrones, Robert Baratheon’s rebellion was waged on a lie that Prince Rhaegar Targaryen had abducted Robert’s betrothed, Lyanna Stark. Outrage spread faster than truth, uniting kingdoms around illusion. When the truth emerged that there had been no abduction, an entire order lay in ruins.

B R Ambedkar warned the Constituent Assembly that liberty would be lost “in the hands of the legislature itself” unless the judiciary stood as a sentinel against excess. He saw the courts as “the sentinel on the qui vive”, ever watchful against power’s overreach. The endurance of democracy, he cautioned, depends not only on the virtue of rulers but on the vigilance of judges.

In a republic governed by law, criticism of the judiciary is not blasphemy; it is a democratic necessity. But critique must come from good faith, not from the art of war. The true test of leadership lies not in tearing institutions down but in reforming them without breaking their spirit. If Caesar’s wife must be above suspicion, then the Republic must be above manipulation. So, if we do not speak for the judiciary today, we may find that tomorrow, there is no one left to speak for us.

(The writer is a law clerk-cum research associate at the Supreme Court of India)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.