Supreme Court accepts Karnataka High Court judge’s apology: ‘Can’t call any part of India as Pakistan’

On Wednesday, the bench perused the report which said the judge tendered a public apology on September 21. “Bearing in mind the apology which has been tendered by the judge of the high court, in the course of the open court proceedings on September 21, 2024, we consider it in the interest of justice and the dignity of the institution to not pursue these proceedings further,” the Supreme Court bench said.

“The text of the report, which has been submitted by the Registrar General, would amply indicate that the observations which were made in the course of the proceedings before the High Court of Karnataka were unrelated to the course of the proceedings and should have best been eschewed. The perception of justice to every segment of society is as important as the rendering as the rendition of justice as an objective fact,” the top court said.

The court also made some “general” observations before closing the proceedings. “Video conferencing and live stream of proceedings has emerged as an important outreach facility of courts to promote access to justice. At the same time, all stakeholders in the judicial system, including judges, lawyers, and litigants, particularly parties in person, have to be conscious of the fact that the reach of the proceedings which take place in the court does not extend to merely those who are physically present but has a significant reach to audiences well beyond the physical precincts of the court. This places an added responsibility on judges and lawyers as well as litigants who appear in person, conduct proceedings conscious of the wider impact of casual observations on the community at large.”

“As judges, we are conscious of the fact that each individual has a certain degree of accumulated predispositions based on our experiences of life, whether early experiences or those which are gained later. At the same time, it’s important that every judge should be aware of their own predispositions. The heart and soul of judging is the need to be impartial and fair. Intrinsic to that process is the need for every judge to be aware of our own predispositions because it is only on the basis of such an awareness that we can truly be faithful to the fundamental obligation of the judge to deliver objective and fair justice,” said the bench.

“We emphasise this point because it is necessary for every stakeholder in the institution to understand that the only values which must guide judicial decision-making are those which are enshrined in the Constitution of India. Casual observations may well reflect a certain degree of individual bias, particularly when they are likely to be perceived as being directed to a particular gender or community. Courts, therefore, have to be careful not to make comments in the course of judicial proceedings, which may be construed as being misogynistic or for that matter, prejudicial to any segment of our society.”

Since the Karnataka High Court is not a party to the proceedings, the bench said it desisted from making any further observations, “save and except to express our serious concern about both the reference to gender and to a segment of the community”.

“Such observations are liable to be construed in a negative light, thereby impacting not only the court or the judge who expressed them, but the wider judicial system. In this view… while we are inclined to close the proceedings, we have made these observations in the hope and expectation that the demands which have been placed on all stakeholders in the judicial system in the electronic age would elicit an appropriate modulation of behaviour both on the part of the bar and the bench in the future.”