NEW DELHI: Breaking new ground, a five-judge Supreme Court bench has, for the first time, refrained from citing foreign court rulings while interpreting constitutional provisions in its opinion on the Presidential Reference. Instead, the bench relied solely on past judgments of the Indian Supreme Court.
Chief Justice B.R. Gavai, heading the bench that also included Justices Surya Kant, Vikram Nath, P.S. Narasimha and A.S. Chandurkar, said the judges wished to “speak in one voice” and base their reasoning on a wholly Indian—or “swadeshi”—interpretation of constitutional provisions concerning the powers and functions of the President and governors in relation to bills passed by state legislatures.
This comes amid a broader trend of collective authorship. On Wednesday, another five-judge bench delivered a judgment on promotions in judicial services without any judge being identified as the author. The practice, which began with the Ayodhya verdict, avoids crediting individual judges. Over the past six months, Justice Narasimha, when presiding over benches, has regularly issued judgments as decisions of the bench rather than in his name, though his colleagues have sometimes been encouraged to take authorship when appropriate.
It is likely, sources suggest, that Justice Narasimha advocated for the unified, anonymous opinion in this reference case as well.
In its Presidential Reference opinion, the bench explained its decision to avoid foreign precedents. Noting that counsel had extensively pointed to the functioning of the Westminster model in the UK and the discretionary powers of the Crown, the court said it did not consider those comparisons determinative. “Our constitutional truth does not lie in either of these extremes but is grounded in the way we have successfully—and proudly—worked our Constitution over three quarters of a century,” the court wrote. While comparative models informed the drafting of the Constitution, the court emphasised that its interpretation and application are “truly swadeshi.”
The court also highlighted key differences between India’s system and those of the UK and the US. India, unlike the UK, has a written constitution and must navigate the complexities of federalism in a diverse nation. The US experience, with its strict separation of powers and presidential veto, also diverges from India’s parliamentary model, where the executive largely drives legislative business.
