An irate Supreme Court on Friday threatened to take action against Justice C.S. Karnan’s lawyer and have him removed from the courtroom for making repeated entreaties to hear the judge sentenced to six-month jail for contempt of court.
The court made it clear that its patience was running out when advocate Mathews Nedumpara made a mention on the third consecutive day before a Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice of India J.S. Khehar.
As soon as the Bench sat down for the day’s hearing in the triple talaq case, Mr. Nedumpara submitted that his client “has nowhere to go and he cannot be impeached without the authority of Parliament. No charges were framed against him.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Mr. Nedumpara asked the Chief Justice to set up a Bench to hear the issue.
“This is enough. You are in the habit of doing this ... you cannot interfere in court proceedings [on triple talaq] like this... If you continue like this, we will have you thrown out,” Chief Justice Khehar told Mr. Nedumpara.
However, the word of caution seemed to have had no effect on the lawyer, who again mentioned the issue when the court assembled post-lunch. Mr. Nedumpara submitted that the Registry was not receiving his petition. “Enough is enough. We will have to be harsh on you,” Chief Justice Khehar told Mr. Nedumpara.
ADVERTISEMENT
On a similar occasion earlier, Chief Justice Khehar had said that the decision to find Justice Karnan guilty and send him to jail for six months was a “considered” one taken unanimously by a Bench of the Supreme Court’s seven seniormost judges on May 9, 2017.
On May 11, Mr. Nedumpara had handed over a writ petition accompanied by a re-call application challenging the prison sentence awarded to Justice Karnan. In his petition, Justice Karnan had claimed that he was not under the disciplinary jurisdiction of either the CJI or the seven judges on the Bench, and that he could be impeached only by an order of the President.
He had contended that the contempt proceedings, conducted in his absence, were a violation of natural principles of justice and sought the order to be declared void ab initio.