Thaindian News

New Delhi, June 1 (IANS) The Supreme Court Wednesday reserved its verdict on a petition by Sikkim High Court Chief Justice P.D. Dinakaran challenging the framing of charges by the Judges Inquiry Committee (JIC) probing allegations of corruption, land grabbing, disproportionate assets and misbehaviour against him.

Justice Dinakaran has contented that the JIC has framed the charges beyond the scope of its jurisdiction.

The apex court bench of Justice G.S. Singhvi and Justice C.K. Prasad, while reserving the verdict, said the JIC was not merely a post office to forward to Chief Justice Dinakaran the charges contained in the notice of motion seeking his impeachment and removal for misconduct.

The notice of motion seeking the removal of Chief Justice Dinakaran was moved by 75 members of the Rajya Sabha.

On Dec 15, 2009, Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari set up the JIC to probe the charges against him. Headed by apex court’s Justice Aftab Alam, the JIC includes Karnataka High Court Chief Justice J.S. Khehar and senior counsel P.P. Rao.

Chief Justice Dinakaran said in his plea that the JIC should have confined itself to the framing of charges as mentioned in the notice of motion. He contested the procedure of the JIC first carrying out investigations and then framing the charges.

Pointing to the possibility of evidence being fabricated with intention of maligning a judge, Justice Singhvi said that if the charges, as contained in the notice of motion, were forwarded to the judge under probe without verification, then it could lead to a catastrophic situation.

“The committee (JIC) is very very important with wide powers. There are deliberate omissions in the scheme of the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968. There are three trained judicial minds on it. Thus, they carefully scrutinise the material before framing charges against the judge (under the scanner),” Justice Singhvi said.

“The JIC was not (contemplated) as a post office to forward the material it received in the notice of motion. If that was the case (then) it would be subversion of the system,” he said.

Appearing for Chief Justice Dinakaran, senior counsel Basava Prabhu Patil said that the procedure adopted by the JIC was contrary to the law and the principle of natural justice.

He said that there was nothing in the Judges (Inquiry) Act that contemplated a preliminary inquiry prior to the framing of charges against a judge under probe.

There was no provision in the act that made the JIC both the investigator (prior to the framing of charges) and the arbitrator as well, Patil told the court.

The senior counsel told the court that the JIC exercised the powers of a civil court thus it could not undertake investigation as done by police or provided under the Criminal Procedure Code.

“In a civil suit there is no provision of investigation or framing of charges,” Patil told the court.

Another senior counsel Amarendra Saran said that there could not be any roving or fishing inquiry against Chief Justice Dinakaran.

The procedure adopted by the JIC was eminently biased against the judge under probe. It has been more than 15 months when the proceedings against Chief Justice Dinakaran were launched and the JIC was still conducting preliminary investigations, he said.

He said the JIC was carrying out its proceedings behind the back of Chief Justice Dinakaran, without informing him.

Saran said on the disproportionate assets related charge there was no mention of the assets that Chief Justice Dinakaran acquired before becoming a judge and those which he acquired after becoming a judge.

Senior counsel Prashant Bhushan, appearing for Forum for Judicial Accountability, said that the constitutional provisions and the scheme of the Judges (Inquiry) Act provided for “investigation and proof (of charges)” by the JIC.

He said the act gave it the liberty of framing its own procedure for doing so. He justified the JIC carrying out preliminary investigation prior to framing of the definite charges in this case.