Then I come to clause (3) of this article. According to this clause, the rights and privileges of the Parliament are being encroached upon. The clause lays down: “The administrative expenses of the Supreme Court including all salaries, allowances and pensions payable to or in respect of the officers and servants of the court, shall be charged upon the revenues of India and any fees or other moneys taken by the court shall form part of those revenues.” I specifically draw the attention of the honourable Members of the House to the words, ‘shall be charged upon the revenues of India’. The implication of this clause is very serious, and of a far reaching character. It means that Parliament shall have absolutely no voice in this matter, and whatever the monetary proposals in respect of these appointments they shall not at all come before Parliament, and they shall stand accepted by the Government automatically, and the Parliament shall have absolutely no voice in the matter, and that this will not be subject to the vote of the Parliament at all. I see absolutely no justification why these salaries and allowances, etc., should not be subject to the vote of Parliament. I can quite understand that we should have such a provision with regard to the salaries and allowances of the Judges. That we have already provided when we passed the relevant articles in respect thereto. But, so far as even the ordinary Chaprasi of the Supreme Court is concerned, even so far as the ordinary punka-pullar of the Supreme Court is concerned, his salary shall not be subject to the vote of Parliament. Why? We should not suspect others; but we should trust ourselves too. If we are asked to trust others, let us not be told that we should not trust ourselves. We trust the Judges of the Supreme Court in many important respects; let us trust the Parliament also to do the right thing in the matters of fixing salaries etc. If a power is not necessary to be conferred on the Judges of the Supreme Court, why should we thrust it upon them and divest ourselves of our own rights and privileges? The salaries of its subordinate officers should certainly be subject to the vote of Parliament and should not be out of the jurisdiction of Parliament. Take for instance, the chief Justice of the Supreme Court places before Parliament…………
