New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday strongly criticised the Madhya Pradesh High Court for the manner in which it terminated the services of women civil judges and declined to reinstate some of them.
The matter came up for hearing before a bench comprising Justices BV Nagarathna and N Kotiswar Singh.
The bench observed that the judges’ hear the cases at length and asked, can the judges’ say lawyers’ are slow, while arguing the matter? The bench said, "Particularly for women, if they are suffering physically and mentally, do not say they are slow and send them home….". Justice Nagarathna orally remarked, "I wish men had menstruation, then only they would understand….".
The bench stressed that the rate of disposal of cases cannot be a yardstick when the judges were suffering mentally and physically. The bench also questioned the setting for disposal of cases for district judiciary. The bench has scheduled the matter for further hearing on December 12.
In January, the apex court took suo motu cognisance of the termination of the six judges by the Madhya Pradesh government in June 2023.
The termination orders were passed by the law department following an administrative committee and a full-court meeting of High Court judges finding their performance during the probation period unsatisfactory. Senior advocate Gaurav Agrawal served as the amicus curiae in the matter.
