The Supreme Court might think about releasing the asset information of judges. Which laws currently govern the disclosure of judges' assets?

According to The Indian Express, Supreme Court judges are anticipated to soon make their assets publicly available. On April 1, at a full court session, this decision was made.

Concerns regarding corruption in India's higher judiciary have increased in light of the recent discovery of substantial sums of money at the home of High Court judge Justice Yashwant Varma in New Delhi. The case for requiring judges to reveal their assets and liabilities to the public has also been reinforced by this incident.

Unlike politicians and government officials, judges are currently not required to disclose this information to the public, and they have typically opted not to.

But things might soon change.

What position has the Supreme Court taken on this matter thus far? At a meeting presided over by the late Justice J S Verma, who was India's Chief Justice at the time, the Supreme Court adopted a resolution in 1997 mandating that judges disclose their assets to the Chief Justice.

"Every judge should declare to the Chief Justice all assets in the form of real estate or investments held in their names, in the names of their spouses, or in the names of any other dependents," the resolution stated. This resolution called for judges' assets to be disclosed only to the Chief Justice, not to the general public.

This resolution called for judges' assets to be disclosed only to the Chief Justice, not to the general public.

On September 8, 2009, more than a decade later, the Supreme Court's entire bench agreed to post judges' asset declarations on the court's website, but it was made clear that this would only be done "voluntarily." Several High Courts followed suit after these declarations were posted on the Supreme Court website in November of that year.

However, no asset declarations from current judges are available, and the Supreme Court website hasn't been updated since 2018. Only 28 of the 33 judges listed on the website have provided the Chief with their asset declarations.

Former judges' statements have been removed from the website.

Despite the Supreme Court's 2019 decision that judges' assets and liabilities do not qualify as "personal information," this action still takes place.

This decision was the result of a case that was started in January 2009 when Subhash Chandra Agarwal, an RTI activist, filed a request under the RTI Act to confirm whether Supreme Court judges had disclosed their assets to the Chief Justice of India, as was agreed upon in 1997.

What is the High Courts' current situation?

There were 770 judges in all High Courts as of March 1st of this year. Out of seven High Courts, only 97 of these judges. These states—Delhi, Punjab & Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Madras, Chhattisgarh, Kerala, and Karnataka—have made their assets and liabilities available to the public. Less than 13% of all High Court judges are represented by this.

Most of the nation's High Courts have resisted making their judges' financial information publicly available. The inclusion of judges' asset disclosures under the Right to Information Act was strongly opposed by the Uttarakhand High Court in a 2012 resolution. The court denied the request, stating that the RTI Act did not apply to such information.

A number of other High Courts, including those in Rajasthan, Bombay, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Gauhati, and Sikkim, provided comparable responses to this publication's RTI requests.

Are elected officials, government workers, and other public servants required to make their assets and liabilities publicly available?

In contrast to judges, public servants are often obliged to disclose their assets, and the public can usually access this information. This accessibility has been greatly aided by the passage of the RTI Act in 2005, which was intended to improve accountability and transparency in government operations.