From Freebies to Jobs: Why CJI Surya Kant Is Asking the Right Questions
For too long, the marble corridors of India’s highest court have felt insulated from the grit of the marketplace. Decisions often arrived wrapped in high-minded constitutional abstraction, leaving the average taxpayer, homebuyer, and job-seeker feeling like a bystander in their own democracy. But a shift is happening. Chief Justice Surya Kant is breaking the ivory tower silence, replacing polite judicial platitudes with a sharp, punchy realism that targets systemic failure.
The Freebies Question and Fiscal Responsibility
When the Chief Justice questions the sustainability of election-timed freebies, he isn’t merely debating fiscal policy; he is voicing the silent frustration of the Indian middle class. We are witnessing a collision between the politics of permanent entitlement and the necessity of economic dignity. The CJI’s skepticism toward blanket cash transfers asks a fundamental question: Are we building a nation of workers or a graveyard of fiscal discipline? For the professional and the entrepreneur, this is not an attack on the poor—it is a long-overdue demand for accountability in how public money is burned.
Jobs, Industry, and the Union Debate
The same pulse of realism thrashed through his commentary on industrial stagnation and the role of trade unions. India’s manufacturing engine has been choking on bureaucratic soot and rigid, outdated frameworks for decades. To call out the friction that stalls projects is not anti-worker; it is pro-survival. You cannot have employment without industry. By dragging these uncomfortable truths into the courtroom, the CJI is acknowledging a reality that young India knows intimately: you cannot litigate your way to prosperity if the factories are closed.
Institutional Accountability and RERA
Nowhere was this demand for performance more visible than in his critique of RERA. For years, the Real Estate Regulatory Authority has often felt like a toothless tiger, watching from the sidelines while homebuyers drowned in debt for houses that existed only on paper. When the head of the judiciary asks if an institution is actually fulfilling its purpose, he is signaling that the era of protection by presence is over. Statutory bodies do not exist to provide comfortable landing spots for retired bureaucrats; they exist to deliver outcomes for citizens.
Protecting the Supreme Court from Political Theatre
Even within his own walls, the CJI is demanding a cleanup. The Supreme Court has increasingly been hijacked as a stage for political theatre, where high-profile petitions leapfrog over the desperate pleas of ordinary litigants. By insisting on procedural hierarchy and warning against the personalization of petitions, Surya Kant is protecting the most precious resource in the country: judicial time. Every hour wasted on a political stunt is an hour stolen from a citizen waiting for justice.
Judicial Time Is Public Time
Another significant observation was his reminder that judicial time is a public resource. Lengthy arguments by senior lawyers and poorly drafted petitions do not just waste court hours; they delay justice for countless others. For the common citizen navigating a slow system, this acknowledgement matters. It recognizes that efficiency and fairness in court processes directly affect real lives.
A Pattern of Economic and Civic Realism
What we are witnessing is a pattern of structural realism. Whether it is welfare, housing, or courtroom discipline, the message is uniform: Work over entitlement. Performance over rhetoric. Results over symbolism.
The Chief Justice isn’t just speaking to lawyers in expensive robes anymore. He is speaking to the person waiting for a flat, the student looking for a job, and the taxpayer tired of seeing their hard work traded for votes. It is a voice of accountability in an age of institutional drift, and it is exactly what the country needs to hear.
