New Delhi: Government on Saturday slammed Congress for criticising it over vacancies in judiciary, saying it was like "devil quoting scriptures" as the opposition party had the record of damaging and trying to erode the sanctity of judiciary while being in power.
Information and Broadcasting Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said the government has the highest regard for the judiciary and is committed to address the shortage of judges in High Courts.
In a statement here, he said the process of appointment of judges would continue even while the new Memorandum of Protocol for such appointments is under consideration.
"The government, in collaboration with the Apex Court, would sincerely endeavor for an early conclusion of the new MoP in the larger interest of transparency and objectivity," Naidu said.
"The Government of India has the highest regard for the Judiciary of the country which is an important pillar of democracy and shares the concern of the Supreme Court over the huge pendency of cases at different levels of Judiciary for different reasons," he said.
The minister said the government is committed to address the shortage of judges in High Courts.
While hitting out at Congress for attacking it over the vacancies, Naidu said the Modi government has approved over 200 new posts over the last two years as against only 20 posts of judges created during 2009-14 when UPA was in power.
"Despite the sincere efforts of the government to increase the strength of judges in High Courts and to address public concern over transparency and objectivity in the selection of judges in the higher judiciary, the Congress party has the audacity to criticize the government of seeking to undermine judiciary, further to the observations of the Supreme Court on the vacancies yesterday," he said.
"It is a recorded history that the Congress party has done the singular damage to democracy and one of its important pillar of Judiciary during its long rule.
"It badly bruised democracy through brazen violation of fundamental rights of citizens by clamping emergency and clearly stated in the Supreme Court that the citizen had no remedy even if shot at by a police officer.
"It further sought to erode the sanctity of Judiciary by inventing concepts like committed judiciary, superseding seniority in promotion of judges etc," Naidu said.
He said Congress party "with such a notorious record of treating democracy and judiciary with contempt, now criticizing the government of seeking to undermining judiciary, is like the devil quoting scriptures."
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