New Delhi: Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Abhishek Banerjee has filed a plea in the Supreme Court claiming his fundamental rights are being repeatedly trampled by the personal tirade carried out by Calcutta High Court judge, Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay, during unrelated judicial proceedings and staged media interviews.
The matter came up before a three-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud today. Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, representing Banerjee, submitted before the court that Justice Gangopadhyay is continuously giving “politically motivated interviews” and be restrained.
The CJI told Singhvi, “You are seeking a writ of mandamus to take action against a judge for ‘politically motivated’ interviews. We should not be issuing notice on this (prayer in the petition)......”.
Banerjee’s counsel informed the court that his client is aggrieved by the prejudicial remarks of Justice Gangopadhyay in the interview and the order passed on January 25, 2024, and also with the alleged incident with respect to Justice Soumen Sen and Justice Amrita Sinha recorded in the order dated January 25.
It was contended before the bench, also comprising Justices Manoj Misra and Satish Chandra Sharma, that the petitioner has serious apprehension that in view of the remarks passed by Justice Gangopadhyay, the proceedings before Justice Amrita Sinha will not be conducted in a free, fair and unbiased manner.
The counsel cited that Banerjee is being summoned by ED and CBI pursuant to orders of Justice Amrita Sinha, and stressed that it is imperative that the matter should be heard by a different bench in view of the order passed on January 29, 2024, by the Supreme Court in suo moto proceedings.
After hearing submissions, the apex court tagged the writ petition of the suo moto proceedings “In Re: Orders of Calcutta High Court Dated January 24 and January 25, and ancillary issues”. “We have suo-motu taken charge of this. We are tagging your matter with the five-judge bench matter,” the CJI said.
The plea has urged the apex court to issue a directive stating that the remarks made by Justice Gangopadhyay within or outside the court premises against Banerjee do not influence the investigation. “Petitioner’s fundamental rights are being repeatedly trampled by the personal tirade carried out by Hon’ble Mr. Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay during unrelated judicial proceedings and staged media interviews”, said the plea.
The plea stated Justice Gangopadhyay “has in transgression to all principles of judicial impropriety, made it his life’s mission, to continue to pass disparaging remarks against the petitioner herein knowing very well that the petitioner is a Member of Parliament and such sporadic remarks completely unrelated to any judicial proceedings before him are causing grave prejudice to the petitioner not only in the on-going proceedings before a Judge of the same High Court, and thus carrying weight, but also in the eyes of the public, especially in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections”.
A five-judge bench led by CJI, on January 29, had transferred to itself all the petitions related to the alleged scam in issuing caste certificates to candidates aspiring for reserved category MBBS seats in West Bengal after two benches of the Calcutta High Court differed over instituting a CBI probe into it.
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