Karwar: People have lost faith in the judicial system as it has become corrupt, said Supreme Court Senior Advocate Prashant Bhushan. Speaking to media persons in Karwar on Saturday, he said the Courts are now under the influence of influential and strong political leaders. He said that the judicial system, like executive and legislative, should also come under scrutiny and come clean. “There is a need for monumental reforms in the judicial system,” he said and made the courts responsible to bring these changes and reforms.

He charged that one is seeing corruption even in selection of judges. “This is why, there is a need to bring a transparent selection by forming a separate selection committee,” he said and added even after four years of passing Lokpal Act, the Union government has not appointed anyone to that post.

Giving details about the contempt of Court case involving his NGO, which was forced to pay Rs 25 lakh, Mr Bhushan said this was related to a case involving a judge, who was accused of receiving bribe from a private hospital. The apex court had directed the Central Bureau of Investigation to look into the mater. As CBI works under the Union government our NGO wanted the case to be investigated by Court monitored Special Investigation Team (SIT), for demanding this the SC slapped a contempt case on us and asked to pay the fine, he said.

He said the kind of corruption that the country saw during the UPA government is missing in the present government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, however, Mr Modi is acting like a dictator. “There is no Freedom of speech in India now,” he said and added that one can’t write anything against the current dispensation, especially Modi. They have the fear of being attacked and trolled on social networking sites.

He charged that National Curriculum Framework committee, which decided the textbooks of schools, have been dominated by members affiliated to RSS. They are turning school syllabus ‘saffron’. The main intention of changing the syllabus is to make Muslims feel inferior and spread hatred against them.