New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Saturday stayed all proceedings before the single judge and division bench of Calcutta High Court in connection with caste certificate scam, which saw unsavoury sparring between the judges. The apex court also stayed a single judge's order directing CBI probe into the alleged scam and scheduled the matter for further hearing on Monday.
A five-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud issued notice to the West Bengal government, the petitioner before the high court, and also the CBI.
The bench, also comprising justices S K Khanna, B R Gavai, Surya Kant, and Aniruddha Bose, said: “What we will do is that we will stay further proceedings. we issue notice to the state of West Bengal and original petitioner… we will list on Monday…We stay all further proceedings before the high court in both writ petition and letters patent appeal… we stay the directions issued by the single judge also directing CBI probe”.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal appeared for West Bengal and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and Attorney General R Venkataramani, represented the Centre. Mehta said that the manner in which the division bench passed the stay order was objectionable as the appeal was entertained even without a proper appeal memo. Mehta said this court under Article 141 had prohibited the same, and “I am not here defending either single judge or division bench order”.
After dictating the order to stay the high court proceedings and the direction for CBI investigation, the CJI said that the court will take up the matter on Monday and “We have taken charge now." Sibal said that it would be filing an appeal against the orders passed by the single judge on January 24 and 25, 2024 in the matter. Mehta also said they would be filing a note to assist the court on procedure of law.
A single judge bench of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay had declared a division bench's order illegal. The unprecedented development took place after the larger bench stayed Justice Gangopadhyay's direction for a CBI probe into irregularities into MBBS admissions in West Bengal.
The apex court suo-motu cognizance of the rare conflict between a single judge and a division bench of the Calcutta high court over a CBI probe into an alleged fake caste certificate scam. On January 25, Justice Gangopadhyay, in an order, had termed the division bench as illegal. The division bench was headed by Justice Soumen Sen and also comprised of Justice Uday Kumar.
On January 24, the division bench had stayed the direction for CBI probe into the matter and held that the state government should be allowed to complete its own investigation into the matter. Justice Gangopadhyay, on January 25, said, "It is clear from the order of the division bench that when it was stayed there was neither any memo of appeal nor any impugned order before the court."
Justice Gangopadhyay accused Justice Sen of indulging in "misconduct" saying what he has done is "to advance the cause of his personal interest to save some political party in power in this State".
"No rule has been shown to me that an appeal can be preferred and the order can be passed thereon in this High Court without the impugned order and without the memorandum of appeal," the judge said in the written order. "I have no other option but to ignore the order of the said Division Bench as the order has been passed in continuation of the illegal appeal void ab initio," he added.
Justice Gangopadhyay requested the Chief Justice of India to look into the matter also citing an instance when Justice Soumen Sen allegedly called another Justice Amrita Sinha in his chamber and asked her to stop live streaming of a case involving Abhishek Banerjee, TMC MP.
“I do not know how a judge, being Justice Soumen Sen, who is under an order of transfer for last more than two years, is acting here as a judge defying the Supreme Court Collegium’s recommendation (dated 16th September, 2021) from this court to Odisha High Court. Who are the persons behind him, who are saving him from such transfer whereby the order of the Supreme Court Collegium can be ignored while the other Judges have been transferred by the same recommendation," he wrote.
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