NEW DELHI: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Tuesday demanded that the Centre take steps speedily to overcome the court stay on implementing reservation for Other Backward Classes in higher education institutions.

Briefing correspondents on the three-day deliberations of the party's central committee which ended on Monday, CPI (M) general secretary Prakash Karat said the meeting expressed concern at the growing "trend of judicial encroachment in the spheres of the executive and Parliament." The party demanded the setting up of a National Judicial Commission.

The central committee also expressed its apprehensions about the Supreme Court judgment on the Ninth Schedule, making laws under it subject to judicial scrutiny.

"The basic features of the Constitution have not been defined by the Supreme Court in the Keshavanand Bharati case. It is necessary to have a clear definition of the basic features of the Constitution. Increasingly, the higher judiciary is intervening in favour of the private sector, and the employers," the central committee said.

Mr. Karat said a number of Supreme Court judgments had of late overturned verdicts favouring workers. At the same time, the trend of curtailing democratic rights and collective action by the higher judiciary continued. The Kerala High Court order banning student organisations and political activities from the campus was one such instance.

The central committee was of the firm opinion that there should be judicial accountability and reforms in the judiciary. The National Judicial Commission, comprising not just serving judges, should be constituted for appointments and related issues.

The meeting reiterated the CPI (M)'s opposition to opening up retail trade to foreign direct investment, and declined to accept the Special Economic Zones Act and rules in the present form. Multiproduct SEZs should not have land beyond 2,000 hectares and it was also necessary to decide which industries required SEZs, the party said.

Disruption condemned

The central committee condemned the "anti-democratic and disruptive tactics of the BJP in the budget session of Parliament and observed that the BJP-RSS combine stepped up communal rhetoric which led to a spate of communal incidents all over the country recently".

It condemned the continuing U.S. pressures on India to desist from going ahead with the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project.

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