It was indeed a wise man who said that judges should shun the spotlight and let their judgments do the talking. But that was before the era of YouTube and 24×7 breaking news. In India’s legal firmament today, judgments do not make news, mainly (I suspect) because these have become one-sided and therefore predictable. The obiter dictum makes news, delivered from the lofty perch of finality, if not infallibility.The Honourable CJI, Surya Kant, is currently not only the master of the roster, but also of the obiter dicta. How can we forget, if not treasure, his denunciation of the three academicians who wrote that chapter on the judiciary for NCERT, banning them from any government engagement? The later cockroach comment is now part of legal folklore. And just recently, in an address at Oxford University, he remarked that India should develop its own “swadeshi jurisprudence”, something even our freedom fighters had not thought of.I am not sure what he meant by this call to a legal atmanirbharta, or whether it is the right course to follow. For, in civilised democracies at least, jurisprudence and laws are aligned with global principles, concepts, conventions, declarations, rights and charters, and till recently we more or less conformed to these universal principles.Swadeshi jurisprudence, it must be lamented, has already arrived in India, which is why, according to the WJP (World Justice Project) Rule of Law ranking for 2025, we are placed at 86 out of 143 countries. We have been consistently slipping down — in 2014, we were at 66. Frankly, I am not surprised, because the evidence is strewn all over the road to swadeshi jurisprudence. It is the price we have paid for the gradual loss of independence, integrity and quality of the judiciary.Jurisprudence in India today appears to be governed by four made-in-India/swadeshi doctrines which should be a blot on any justice system: fait accompli, sealed cover, ignore the science, and reward the criminal. Importantly, even constitutional challenges to the executive’s actions are kept on the backburner for so long (Article 370, CAA, SIR, Shiv Sena split) that by the time they are decided, it is impossible to turn back the clock and undo what the government of the day has already implemented on the ground.The sealed cover has become the standard fallback option for denying full disclosure to civil society petitioners, or for not giving rebuttable reasons for a particular judgment (Rafale, Pegasus, Vantara, Hindenburg). Increasingly, this spectre of our swadeshi jurisprudence, like the executive, shows disdain and contempt for science, as in the case of stray dogs, Aravalli mountains, the Char Dham highway, and the Great Nicobar project. More trust is reposed on government-appointed committees and patently partisan ministries than on scientists, domain experts and specialised organisations working in the relevant field. Finally, this mutant form of justice also ensures that the criminal will be duly allowed to keep the proceeds of his crime (Ram Mandir theft, electoral bonds) even as his actions are declared irregular! A judicial paraprosdokian if ever there was one.Perhaps the biggest stain on our swadeshi system of justice is the default denial of bail to every three out of four accused who are otherwise entitled to it: 74 per cent of the prison population comprises undertrials, and the position keeps getting worse. Eminent scholars, students, social activists are denied bail for as long as five years, even though they are not convicted, and in many cases their trials have not even commenced. A university professor with 90 per cent disability is deemed to be a national security threat, and kept in jail for years without a trial. He finally gets acquitted and released by a High Court, but is pushed back in within 24 hours at an urgent hearing by the apex court! And here is the supreme irony — those who are not convicted are kept in jail, while the convicted elite are out on parole whenever they want a breath of fresh air!Millions of voters are denied their voting rights by a capricious CEC and his untested algorithms, their appeals are kept pending, but the swadeshi response to their entreaties is a callous: Never mind, you can vote in the next elections! An exercise based on mysterious algorithms, which has disenfranchised millions of citizens, has been given the highest court’s imprimatur of approval.Judicial orders are flouted by the executive on a routine and continuing basis — on Aadhaar, demolitions, bulldozers, hate speech, voter rolls, citizenship, to mention just a few areas, but there is no pushback or punitive action by the courts. The swadeshi jurisprudence model has ensured that our judicial system is broken and on the point of total collapse. There is a backlog of 5.4 crore cases which will take 323 years to clear; of these, 1.8 lakh cases are pending for more than 30 years. India has only 15 judges per 10 lakh population against a developed country average of 150-200 (China’s figure is 300).It gets worse — the judiciary has carved out so many privileges for itself, it is accountable to no one. A Collegium system ensures that only judges can appoint judges, and that too in the most opaque of manners; judicial corruption cannot be investigated unless the judiciary itself permits it; even though all government appointees are required to declare their assets, only 12 per cent of judges have done so; it has been reported that, historically, appointments to the Supreme Court are limited to just 250 families in the entire country. This is a swadeshi blueprint for judicial anarchy and ochlocracy, not jurisprudence.No, sir, the last thing we need is a swadeshi version of what a justice system should be. This model ensures that democracy (and justice) has become a privilege available only to those with influence. Swadeshi slogans should be left to the politicians; the jurisprudence of rights, justice and equality needs a more solid and time-tested foundation. We need to adopt best global practices and principles and dig ourselves out of this swadeshi hole. And yes, let judgments, not obiter dicta, do the talking.— The writer is a retired IAS officer