Govt and Judiciary again heading for confrontation

New Delhi, Nov 19 (UNI) The Union Government and the Judiciary are again heading for confrontation on the important issues of appointment of judges and the implementation of OBC Reservation Policy in admission in centrally-run educational institutions of higher learning.

The Union Government has recently, virtually refused to comply with the directions of the Supreme Court to give admission to the general category candidates on the seats which are lying vacant due to non-availability of eligible OBC candidates for admissions to IITs, IIMs and Post-Graduate medical sciences courses.

The five-judge Constitution Bench has directed the Centre to file its affidavit in response to its application filed by anti-reservationists alleging that the creamy layer among the OBCs are being given admissions under the 27 per cent quota policies for them by raising the upper income limit from 2.5 lakh to 4.5 lakh.

The apex court had directed the government to exclude the creamy layer from the benefits of reservation.

On the issue of elevation of Judges to the Supreme Court, the Central Government and the judiciary are on a war path.

The Centre had returned the recommendations of the five-member Supreme Court Collegium headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan for reconsideration.

The Collegium had recommended the name of the Chief Justices of different High Courts namely Justices H L Dattu, A K Ganguly and R M Lodha for elevation to the Supreme Court.

The Law Ministry objected to the recommendation on the grounds that three senior most Chief Justices namely Justices A P Shah, A K Patnaik and V K Gupta have been overlooked by the Collegium.

The recommendations were returned on November 15 for reconsideration.

The Chief Justice has reaffirmed the recommendations and sent back the file to the Union Law Ministry yesterday.

Now the government is bound to accept it but there no time limit within which the recommendation has to be implemented.

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