A day when the five-member bench of the Calcutta High Court granted bail to heavyweight Trinamool Congress leaders accused in Narada bribery case, a letter surfaced from a decide who strongly objected to method wherein the switch plea filed by the CBI within the case was listed earlier than a division bench as a writ petition.
Justice Arindam Sinha, a sitting decide of the High Court who has been half of the Narada listening to proper from the start, wrote a letter to Acting Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal, criticising the way wherein the courtroom entertained the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) plea for staying the decrease courtroom’s ruling that granted bail to the arrested politicians.
“Our conduct is unbecoming of the majesty the excessive courtroom instructions. We have been lowered to a mockery,” Justice Sinha wrote in his letter.
In his two-page letter, a copy of which is available with IANS, Justice Sinha wrote that the Appellate Side Rules of the High Court, which govern the procedure of listing such matters, require that a motion seeking transfer either on the civil or the criminal side, has to be heard by a single judge.
The transfer petition under Section 407 of the Code of Criminal Procedure was taken up by a division bench of the High Court on May 17 based on an email sent by the CBI to the court and a mentioning made by Additional Solicitor General Y.J. Dastoor. “However, the first Division Bench took up the matter treating it to be a writ petition. Even a writ petition under Article 228 of the Constitution should have gone to the single judge having determination,” he mentioned.
The communication (despatched by the CBI to High Court on May 17) couldn’t have been handled as a writ petition just because no substantial query as to the interpretation of regulation has been raised, he added. “The mob issue could also be a floor on deserves for adjudication of the movement however might the primary division bench have taken it up and proceed to listen to it as a writ petition is the primary query,” the letter mentioned.
The judge also questioned the manner in which the division bench stayed the bail granted by the special court to the accused on May 17.
“Whether the High Court exercising power in the matter of transfer of a criminal case at this stage on its own initiative could have passed the order of stay is the second question,” the decide opined. He questioned the excessive courtroom’s keep on the decrease courtroom’s bail order, saying that the CBI’s utility was not supported by an affidavit.
He additionally criticized the way in which the division bench was not accessible the following day and didn’t entrust one other bench to listen to the matter. “The public have been introduced with the scenario of the excessive courtroom having interfered with the freedom of their elected representatives after which it might not be accessible for that day to adjudicate on their liberty,” the letter said.
He also said that the two-judge division bench had a difference of opinion, with one favouring the granting of interim bail and the other not, but the procedures for such situations were not followed. In case of difference within a bench, a third judge’s opinion is usually taken, Sinha wrote, adding that it had not been done in this case.
“When the judges on a division bench differ on any point or issue, the same is referred to a third learned judge for opinion. In the premises, Rule 1 in Chapter II of Appellate Side Rules do not apply, Chapter VII provides for references to a full bench. Such reference arises when the view taken by a division bench is inconsistent with the view taken by another division bench,” it was acknowledged.
Justice Sinha, subsequently, requested all judges to salvage the scenario by taking appropriate steps together with convening of full courtroom, if crucial, for “reaffirming the sanctity of our Rules and our unwritten code of conduct”.
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