Expect Apology, Cannot Treat Judicial Officers As Subordinates: SC

The Supreme Court criticized the Finance Ministry on Monday for treating the judicial staff of the Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT) as subordinates, demanding an explanation for the ministry’s request for DRTs to collect extensive data on short notice.

The court expressed surprise that the DRTs were tasked with gathering significant data regarding amounts recovered based on their orders. “The ministry owes an explanation for asking the DRT to collect such a large volume of data in a limited timeframe,” the bench stated.

Justices Abhay S. Oka and Augustine George Masih were reviewing a case linked to lawyers’ strikes at the DRT in Visakhapatnam. The DRT had previously informed the court that certain applications were postponed because staff were busy with the data collection mandated by the ministry. The court had asked the Finance Ministry to submit an affidavit on this matter by September 30.

The bench was dissatisfied with the ministry’s justification upon learning that all DRTs were required to collect data on cases valued at ₹100 crore and above, new cases filed, and amounts recovered. Justice Oka questioned, “Is the DRT expected to have this recovery data? How will they know how much the banks have recovered based on their orders? Are they supposed to contact every bank to find out what borrowers have repaid?”

The court was taken aback that the ministry had emailed all DRTs on September 9, asking for the data by September 12—just three days later. “You are treating judicial staff as if they are your subordinates. We expect an apology from the government for this. It is unacceptable to demand such extensive data collection in such a short period. If you want data, you should provide additional staff to assist the DRT,” Justice Oka remarked.

The ministry’s counsel explained that the data was needed for a meeting with stakeholders to discuss system improvements. However, the bench reiterated that if the ministry needed such information, it should allocate more resources rather than burden the DRT officials. Justice Oka concluded, “It’s fortunate that the court was alerted to this issue; otherwise, this practice would have continued.”

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