Breaking down several times in his half-hour speech addressed directly to Prime Minister Narendra Modi who was present at the Annual Chief Ministers and Chief Justices Conference on Sunday, Chief Justice of India Tirath Singh Thakur launched a scathing attack on government inaction, blaming the Centre for stalling appointment of judges to the High Courts and doing nothing to increase the number of courts and judges, thus denying the poor and undertrial prisoners their due of justice.
The Chief Justice asked what was the point of ‘Make in India’ and inviting foreign direct investments when investors would worry about timely delivery of justice in case of litigation. “Therefore, not only in the name of the litigant… the poor litigant [he chokes with emotion] languishing in jail but also in the name of the country and progress, I beseech you to realise that it is not enough to criticise the judiciary…You cannot shift the entire burden on to the judiciary,” he said in an unprecedented criticism of the government.
“I feel that if nothing else has helped justice, an emotional appeal might,” Chief Justice Thakur told an audience of his fellow Supreme Court judges, the Chief Ministers, the Chief Justices of the High Courts, the former Chief Justices, senior officials of the Union Law and Justice Ministry, dignitaries and the media at Vigyan Bhawan as the Prime Minister and Union Law Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda watched.
He said there were 434 judicial vacancies in the High Courts as of date, “thanks to” the fact that judicial appointments remained in limbo because of the prolonged litigation over the NDA government’s National Judicial Appointments Commission laws.
“After the litigation, we cleared pending proposals [for High Court judicial appointments] in six weeks. We have appointed 54 High Court judges whose cases were earlier pending [before the NJAC case],” the Chief Justice said.

Source: The Hindu