Ex-Chief Justice TS Sivagnanam resigns from SIR tribunal, says it will take four years to clear Kolkata appeals

KOLKATA: Former Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court, Justice TS Sivagnanam, on Thursday resigned from the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) tribunal on personal grounds. After clearing 1,777 appeals over 22 days and rejecting none, Justice Sivagnanam said at its present pace, the tribunal would need four years to clear all Kolkata appeals before it.

He submitted his resignation to Calcutta HC Chief Justice Sujoy Paul, as well as to the Election Commission.

Initially, Justice Sivagnanam was appointed to the tribunal for petitioners from North 24 Parganas and Kolkata but he also conducted hearings for cases from Malda, Murshidabad and Birbhum as they were referred to him by the Supreme Court.





Md Mahatab Sheikh, a Congress candidate from Farakka, was the first to have his name cleared by the tribunal headed by Justice Sivagnanam. Sheikh's voting rights were restored and he won the seat to become an MLA.

Justice Sivagnanam, who will be flying back to Chennai on Friday, said: "I cleared 1,777 appeals between April 5 and 27. I even heard the appeals of Suprabuddha Sen, the grandson of eminent painter Nandalal Bose, and his wife Deepa Sen and restored their voting rights. I approached the appeals with an open mind. Later, I verified the appeals from Kolkata South and Kolkata North. I operated daily from 8.30am to 5pm to clear as many cases as I could, and even on Sundays, I cleared cases without any staff."

"I heard the appeals of the nuns of Missionaries of Charity and allowed 30 or more of them to vote. Although the certificates of the nuns did not match those from their pre-order lives, I did not reject any appeal," he added.

Justice Sivagnanam felt that it would take another four years to completely process the hearings for Kolkata. "There are still 1 lakh pending appeals. There were some problems with the online appeals; judges are accustomed to giving long orders but the portal has word-count restrictions, so I started giving orders in four to five lines to accommodate this. Actually, I am accustomed to e-court proceedings, but not all ex-judges are tech-savvy. Although I am not a technocrat, I understand the login process and how to upload orders — as I have experienced it before — but other retired judges might not have the same experience. The technical support from the state govt for the 19 tribunals was excellent," he said.

The former judge noted that there is a need for a special button in the system so that a notice can be sent to applicants who have appealed.
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