By IANS,
New Delhi : Despite Supreme Court judges deciding to make public their assets, Law Minister M. Veerappa Moily Thursday said the government would enact a law for making the disclosure mandatory for judges across the country and would use this information for probing criminal or corruption cases against them.
“Despite this decision to disclose their assets, parliament will have to enact a law to use these documents (pertaining to the disclosure of judges’ assets) in relation to cases of (judges’) accountability or under the Judges Enquiry Act,” Moily told reporters.
Moily welcomed the apex court’s decision to make public its judges’ assets on its website at the earliest.
“Though I do not want to embarrass the judiciary, the law will have to be enacted to protect the judges’ interests,” he added.
On Aug 3, Moily had to withdraw from the Rajya Sabha the Judges (Declaration of Assets and Liabilities) Bill, 2009, as MPs took exception to the provision that judges could disclose their asserts only to chief justices of the high courts and the Supreme Court or to the president.
The bill, however, provided that details of judges’ assets could be accessed by various investigative agencies for probing cases of judicial misconduct, impropriety or corruption.