'Judiciary functions as a medieval guild': Sanjeev Sanyal says legal system is holding back India's growth

India's judicial system is now the single biggest drag on the country's economic progress and it functions "as a medieval guild," says economist and Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (PM-EAC) member Sanjeev Sanyal, calling for an open and honest public debate on judicial reform.

"I have raised this issue and there is a fatwa from the Tamil Nadu Bar Council against me for even suggesting that maybe these medieval vacations should be gotten rid of. But anyway, there is general consensus now in the country that the judicial system is now the single biggest constraint to economic progress and Viksit Bharat. It simply functions as a medieval guild now," Sanyal said in a podcast conversation with Groww.

According to him, the problems go far beyond judges. "It's just not about the judges. There's a whole ecosystem - the bar council, the senior advocates - and the way the whole thing is run is like a medieval coterie. And the biggest beneficiaries of that are actually these senior advocates who earn outsized fees for certain cases. Those kinds of fees are not charged anywhere in the world. They are the best-paid lawyers in the world."

"This system has to be changed. But the first thing we've got to understand - and this idea has to be generalised - is that the judiciary is ultimately a part of the state and they are basically there to provide a service like anybody else," he added. 

Criticising the judicial vocabulary and symbolism, Sanyal questioned: "A judge is a civil servant who's supposed to provide service. So first of all, we should get rid of all this language we use. When you send a petition to the judiciary you have to call it a prayer. Why? Why is it a prayer? Who are we praying to? In fact somebody should bring this up - that in a secular country, how can you be praying to the organ of the state?"

The economist said the legal fraternity needs to come down to a more grounded and modern approach. "We need to begin to bring this whole thing down to something more modern, and have an honest national public debate on this issue."

This isn't the first time Sanyal has flagged the legal system as a bottleneck. In another podcast last month with Sangam Talks, he said, "This (judiciary) is in some ways the single biggest constraint to India's growth. It is now more behind the times than the bureaucracy."

Sanyal again noted that it wasn't just the judges, but the entire ecosystem that is holding things back. "It needs huge change — and I’m not only going to blame the judiciary, as in the judges — there's a whole ecosystem and in fact many cases it's the upper echelons of the lawyers and the senior advocates, bar councils, etc. that are actually stopping progress."