'Premature': Eight Retired Judges Issue Appeal to Justice Swaminathan Over Action Against Lawyer Who Alleged Bias
New Delhi: A Madras high court bench comprising two judges, Justice G.R. Swaminathan and Justice K. Rajasekar, has summoned an advocate, S. Vanchinathan, who had alleged communal and caste bias by Justice G.R. Swaminathan, to appear before it in person.
Eight former judges have issued an appeal to him in the aftermath of the contentious decision.
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An appeal to Justice GR Swaminathan and his benchmate Justice K Rajasekar
Advocate Vanchinathan's petition alleging certain allegations against Justice GR Swaminathan to the Chief Justice and calling for an inquiry has now resulted in a proposed contempt action against the advocate. He was summoned by the judge sitting in a division bench.
It has been held that against the conduct, impropriety or misbehaviour of a judge no direct action can be launched by lawyers as per the judgment of the Supreme Court in C.Ravichandran Iyer Vs. Justice A M Bhattacharjee, 1995 (5) SCC 457. The Supreme Court has directed that if anyone wants to send a petition against a judge's conduct, it should be sent to the Chief Justice of India directly.
If and when the Chief Justice of India is of the opinion that it requires an investigation into the truthfulness or otherwise, he can constitute an "in-house inquiry" into those allegations made against the judge. It is only when the in-house committee is of the opinion that there is a prima facie truth in the allegations made, he can take or order appropriate action in the matter. This is the established procedure as of now. The same procedure has also been followed in the recent case of Justice Yashwant Varma of the Allahabad High Court.
Hence, we are of the opinion that in the absence of any such action taken by the Chief Justice of India on the petition sent by the Advocate, it will be premature for the learned judges to initiate action against the lawyer concerned. Admittedly the lawyer was summoned to appear before the court on 29th of July.
We appeal to the learned judges to give up any action at this stage and also to await any decision to be taken by the Chief Justice of India in the petition sent by Advocate Vanchinathan.
We are issuing this appeal only in the interest of the judicial institution and we have no other interest in the matter.
Signed for and on behalf of all the 8 judges whose names are noted above.
Justice K. Chandru
1. Justice K Chandru
2. Justice D Hariparanthaman
3. Justice CT Selvam
4. Justice Akbar Ali
5. Justice P Kalaiyarasan
6. Justice S Vimala
7. Justice K K Sasidharan
8. Justice S S Sundar
Note: Due to paucity of time, all the above judges have sent written confirmation to Justice K Chandru and have authorized him to issue the above statement.
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