New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday referred to a five-judge Constitution Bench a batch of writ petitions challenging the validity of the Constitution amendment and the National Judicial Appointments Commission law to replace the collegium system of judicial appointments.

A three-judge Bench of Justices Anil R. Dave, J. Chelameswar and Madan Lokur while referring the issue to the Chief Justice H.L. Dattu for posting before a larger bench said the question of maintainability and stay of the operation of the NJAC law would also be decided by the larger bench.

As there was no stay it would be open for the Union government to notify the NJAC and the Constitution amendment laws to give effect to the NJAC mechanism.

It was the contention of Fali Nariman and others that Parliament did not have the competence to pass the National Judicial Appointments Commission Bill in August 2014 even before the Constitution was amended to provide for replacing the collegium system.

It was pointed out that Parliament would get the power to pass the NJAC Bill only after the Constitution stood amended on December 31, 2014 when the President gave assent.

They argued that the new system of appointing judges would affect the independence of the judiciary.