Yashwant Varma’s conduct doesn’t inspire confidence: SC

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court on Wednesday reserved its verdict on Justice Yashwant Varma's petition challenging both an in-house inquiry committee report recording his alleged complicity in the case regarding discovery of sacks of cash from his official residence and the then CJI Sanjiv Khanna's recommendation for his removal from judgeship.

Rejecting his plea for a week's adjournment right at the start of the hearing, a bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Augustine G Masih appeared to show the judge and his counsel, Kapil Sibal, the 'writing on the wall' with pithy observations, including "your conduct does not inspire confidence", during the more than hour-long hearing.

When Sibal said the principles of natural justice were sacrificed at the altar of the inquiry process and that the Allahabad high court judge was pronounced guilty through media trial because of a video of burning cash had been uploaded on SC website, the bench said that might not have been prudent, but "putting it on the website does not mean everything (the probe process, its report and the ex-CJI's recommendation for initiation of removal proceedings) got so vitiated that you will go scot-free".

The bench told Varma, "You are a judge, and you know your case. We don't want to spill something right now. Let Parliament decide."

CJI has duty towards nation: SC on Varma case
On the challenge to the constitutionality of the CJI's recommendation for stripping Justice Yashwant Varma of judgeship, the bench said, "The CJI is not a post office. As the leader of the judiciary, he has a duty and responsibility towards the nation. If based on material before him, he felt that a recommendation was needed, he has the authority to do so."

Sibal said the in-house committee's recommendation to remove the judge when the panel had not adjudged him guilty of owning the cash had resulted in the govt getting involved in the removal motion and politicisation of an otherwise purely constitutional process.

The bench disagreed and further said that Section 3(2) of Judges Protection Act, 1985, empowered the SC and HCs to take decisions to deal with judges as the situation warranted and the in-house procedure, which was non-punitive, was a process to identify the black sheep among judges through a preliminary inquiry, result of which would enable the CJI to take an appropriate decision.

The Justice Datta-led bench turned to the conduct of Justice Varma and asked, "Why did the judge not raise the violation of principles of natural justice after the committee submitted its report? Why did you not approach the SC to remove the video from its website if it fuelled a media trial and affected your innocence? You could have raised these issues much before. You knew that in-house committee report could lead to a recommendation for your removal. But you waited for the result of in-house inquiry. Once it turned out to be unfavourable, you decided to challenge it."

Sibal said the composition of the inquiry committee would comprise of an SC judge, an HC chief justice and a jurist. "With the CJI recommending removal, will the committee be able to go beyond the CJI's recommendation?" he asked.

The bench said, "The CJI has acted as per the in-house procedure which has been upheld in three judgments of the SC, and is the law of the land. We have to send a message to society that what is contemplated in the in-house procedure has been followed by the CJI."