Tribunalisation Of Justice In India: Efficiency Or Executive Capture?
- IJLLR Journal
- Mar 27
- 2 min read
Gayatri Kammela, The West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata
Introduction
The expansion of the administrative state in modern times has brought about a radical transformation in the character of adjudication in its practical aspects. In India, with the spurt in the volume of regulatory legislation, the growth of welfare legislation and especially, the expansion of the economic sector of the country, the volume of disputes arose to a vast extent that traditional courts found themselves incapable of coping with them and a need was felt for special modes of adjudication. These modes took the form of what is now popularly referred to as “tribunalisation” of justice.
Tribunals or quasi-judicial bodies for the adjudication of disputes under specified heads of taxation, service matters, environmental and other forms of regulation, laws about corporate- organisational activity, were the result of an attempt to combine expert adjudication in law with that of the subject-matter itself and at the same time, take the pressure off the regular courts. The constitutional status of these tribunals was further secured by Articles 323A and 323B of the Constitution of India.
Unfortunately, tribunals though an innovative way out of a deadlock, have placed a question mark over their independence and if on the one hand they promise to hasten the delivery of social justice and make it more effectively attainable, on the other, their structure places them within the grip of the executive in so far as appointments, conditions of service, tenure, etc., are concerned. Thus, it poses a fundamental dilemma: Do tribunals simplify the path of justice, or do they constitute an avenue for the executive to pass over the head of the cherished and honourable old lady, the Judiciary?
