Next hearing on competition panel on Nov 21

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court today heavily came down on the appointment of a bureaucrat to head a quasi-judicial body, terming this as an attempt to usurp the powers of the judiciary. Attorney General Soli Sorabjee has given the court an undertaking that the Competition Commission will not carry out judicial functions. In any case, during the first year of the Commission’s tenure, no judicial functions had been envisaged. The next hearing will be held on November 21, ’03 and the Centre has to file its counter-affidavit by then. The Competition Commission is to replace the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commission once the MRTP Act, 1969 is repealed.
The constitution of the Commission was notified on October 16, ’03 and commerce secretary Dipak Chatterji was expected to take over as the chairman in a few days. The PIL questioned the proposal for discharge of judicial functions by a retired bureaucrat as the chairman of the Commission.
Senior advocate RK Jain, appearing for a PIL filed by one Brahm Dutt, a resident of Faridabad, submitted that the Commission was to replace the MRTPC which was always headed by a retired chief justice of a high court. “How can a judicial function be discharged by a retired bureaucrat as the head of a commission created to deal with mergers and demergers of companies running into thousands of crores and the orders of which were to be executed by high courts?� Mr Jain asked.
Referring to a judgement in an earlier case decided by the SC in 1987, Mr Jain said the appointment was a clear violation of the apex court order and liable to be struck down. The 1987 judgement had held that all tribunals which function as a substitute to the high courts should ordinarily headed by a retired chief justice of a high court or a senior judge of the high court.