Bodies like ECI, CAG must function outside political influence: Justice BV Nagarathna

Supreme Court judge Justice BV Nagarathna on Saturday (April 4) said that constitutional bodies like the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) must function independently and outside political influence to ensure that the integrity of democratic governance remains intact.

Elaborating further, Justice Nagarathna said that specialised institutions were deliberately created by the Constitution to oversee critical domains where the common political process may fall short in terms of ensuring neutrality and accountability.

Elections as source of authority

Referring to the significance of the ECI under Article 134, Justice Nagarathna stated that elections were not just periodic events but the core mechanism that leads to the creation of political authority.

Justice Nagarathna turned to the mechanics of electoral control, observing that authority over how elections are conducted ultimately shapes the terrain on which political actors compete. In her view, the process itself is not neutral ground; whoever holds sway over it influences the balance of contest in a democracy.

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Drawing on the Supreme Court’s ruling in T.N. Seshan v. Union of India, she pointed out that the judiciary had already characterised the ECI as a constitutional body of considerable weight, entrusted with safeguarding the credibility of elections.

"Elections are not merely periodic events; they are the mechanism through which political authority is constituted. Our constitutional democracy has amply demonstrated smooth changes in Government due to elections being held on a timely basis. Control over that process is, in effect, control over the conditions of political competition itself,” she said, speaking at the first Dr Rajendra Prasad Memorial Lecture on "Constitutionalism beyond Rights: Why Structure Matters" at Chanakya National Law University, Patna, as quoted by Live Law.

Oversight of public expenditure

As for the office of the CAG, she referred to its mandate under Article 148. Public spending, she said, cannot be reduced to routine administration; it is the channel through which priorities are set, and state policy takes material form.

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Without independent scrutiny, those decisions risk passing without meaningful accountability. The CAG’s external audits, she noted, serve precisely that function, placing expenditure under the lens of an authority that stands apart from both the executive and the legislature responsible for it.

Fiscal balance and institutional logic

On fiscal federalism, Justice Nagarathna spoke of the Finance Commission under Article 280 as a structural check against financial leverage turning into political pressure. Assigning the distribution of resources to a constitutionally anchored body, she suggested, is meant to keep that process tethered to principle rather than expediency.

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"These institutions share a common design logic. They are insulated, specialised, and tasked with overseeing domains where the ordinary political process may be insufficient to ensure neutrality. It is of utmost importance that these institutions function independently and not to be influenced by political processes," she said.

Regulatory architecture and warning

She also pointed to the expanding network of statutory regulators that operate alongside constitutional bodies, citing entities such as the Competition Commission of India, the Securities and Exchange Board of India, and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. These institutions, she indicated, have been set up to oversee sectors where technical complexity and economic stakes demand a degree of specialised supervision.

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"The unmistakable lesson of history is that constitutional collapse occurs through the disabling of its structure and the violation of rights merely follows. The dismantling of structure, in turn, occurs when institutions stop checking each other. In that moment, elections may continue, courts may function, laws may be enacted by the Parliament; and yet, power is effectively not restrained because the structural discipline no longer exists,” she said.