Dhankhar said that the President of India holds a highly elevated position and takes the oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution.”There is a directive to the President by a recent judgment. Where are we heading? What is happening in the country? We have to be extremely sensitive. It is not a question of someone filing a review or not. We never bargained for democracy for this day,” Dhankhar said, addressing the 6th batch of Rajya Sabha interns at the Vice-President’s Enclave.”President being called upon to decide in a time-bound manner, and if not, becomes law. So we have judges who will legislate, who will perform executive functions, who will act as super-parliament, and absolutely have no accountability because law of the land does not apply to them,” he added.”We cannot have a situation where you direct the President of India, and on what basis? The only right you have under the Constitution is to interpret the Constitution under Article 145(3),” he further remarked.Stressing the principle of separation of powers, he underlined, “When the Executive – the government – is elected by people, the government is accountable to Parliament, the government is accountable to the people at elections. There is a principle of accountability in operation. In Parliament, you can ask questions, critical questions, because the governance is by the Executive. But if this Executive governance is by judiciary, how do you ask questions? Whom do you hold accountable in an election?”“Time has come when our three institutions – legislature, judiciary, and executive – must blossom. And they blossom best, and best for the nation, only when they operate in their own area. Any incursion by one in the domain of the other poses a challenge, which is not good,” he said.He also criticised the court for inaction regarding the recent incident in which a huge pile of cash was found inside the bungalow of Delhi High Court judge, Justice Yashwant Varma.“An event happened on the night of 14th and 15th of March in New Delhi, at the residence of a judge. For seven days, no one knew about it,” he said.He questioned whether such a delay was justifiable or acceptable, and whether it raised fundamental concerns.The Vice-President said no FIR has been filed against the judge after the cash haul.”The Constitution of India has accorded immunity from prosecution only to the Honourable President and the Honourable Governors. So how come a category beyond law has secured this immunity?” he questioned.Mr Dhankhar said any investigation is the domain of the Executive and questioned why a committee of three judges was examining the cash haul case.He said over a month has passed since the cash haul. “It has now been over a month. Even if it is a can of worms. Even if there are skeletons in the cupboard, it’s time to blow up the can. Time for its lid to go out. And time for the cupboard to collapse. Let the worms and skeletons be in the public domain so that cleansing takes place,” he said.Stressing the need for a proper investigation, Dhankhar criticised the slow pace of developments, saying that if such an incident had occurred at his residence, the response would have been immediate. He called for transparency, stating that “even if there are skeletons in the cupboard,” the time had come for the truth to be exposed so that institutional cleansing could begin.
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