Make Process Of Nomination And Election Of Devaswom Board Members Open And Transparent, Kerala HC Tells Govt [Read Judgment]

Time has now come for the Executive and the Legislature to act and cause framing of appropriate Rules/ Procedure/Mechanism to make the process of nomination and election of members to the Boards open and transparent, the bench said.The Kerala High Court, in a recent judgment, has highlighted the necessity to make the process of nomination and election of members to the Devaswom Board open. With regard to these submissions, the bench observed: “This rather uncanalised method of choice of candidates given to the Ministers and Legislators would certainly throw suspicion of favouritism, cronyism, patronisation and even nepotism.” The bench also observed that the Act is completely silent with regard to the manner in which candidates are identified by ministers for being nominated while, as regards the candidature of a member put up for election by the legislators is concerned, Schedule II of the Act only says that every Legislator would be entitled to nominate a duly qualified person. In other words, it is irrefragable that persons would be able to obtain candidature only if they are known to and cultivate connections of such nature so as to be identified by the Ministers or Legislators and further since such candidates would perhaps find no competition at all, the general citizenry being not involved either in the choice, scrutiny or nomination/election, it certainly may lead to cronyism, favouritism, patronisation and such other irrelevant considerations, while the field of choice is created for nomination/election of members to the Board.” The court further suggested: “The Government may, either allow citizens to offer their candidature in a prescribed manner by stipulating specific qualifications or conditions or the Ministers and Legislators, within the electorate, may make a choice of their candidates, as is now provided in the Statute, but with an obligation and enjoinment to disclose such nominations for public scrutiny and opinion suitably, perhaps in a website maintained for this purpose. Once the nominations of the candidates are made available for public information and scrutiny, it would also be the desideratum that a proper mechanism, either in the form of a Subcommittee or such other, be constituted by the Government to assess and evaluate all such candidates and then place the names for consideration before the Ministers and the Legislators, as the case may be.” Justice Devan Ramachandran ended his judgment observing thus: “Such action to ensure transparency and openness is the need of the hour and we are certain that every Government who believes in the dignity of democracy would employ their wisdom for this purpose without any reservation.