Journalism of Courage
The Supreme Court Tuesday junked the plea challenging the recommendation of its Collegium to elevate advocate L Victoria Gowri as a judge of the Madras High Court.
“We are not entertaining the writ petition. Reasons to follow,” a bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and B R Gavai said after a hearing that started before the usual working hours of the court.
Meanwhile, Victoria Gowri took oath as additional judge of Madras High Court Tuesday. A section of lawyers, part of the All India Lawyers Union, staged a protest outside the court against her appointment.
A recommendation by the Supreme Court Collegium for her appointment on January 17 led to protests by a section of the lawyers in Tamil Nadu, They pointed to her previous association with the BJP and alleged instances of hate speech by her.
The petitioners sought a stay of the warrant of appointment, saying that the “material (against her) reflects a mindset which is antithetical with the ideals of the constitution. They argued that this material “may not have been available” to the Collegium before it went ahead with the recommendation.
The bench, however, said it is only “conjectures and surmises” that the material was not available to the Collegium. Even the consultee judges would have given their opinion, the court said.
“There are consultee judges from the state high court. Both of them are local judges. They have worked in the state of Tamil Nadu. We have to presume that they have the knowledge of the facts,” said Justice Gavai.
The bench also said people with political backgrounds had been judges in the past. “There have been cases where people with political backgrounds have taken oath as judges of the Supreme Court and High Court,” said Justice Khanna.
“I also have a political background. I have been a judge for the last 20 years. I don’t think my political views at any point of time weighed with my decisions,” said Justice Gavai, who also referred to Justice V R Krishna Iyer, who was a minister in the Communist party-led Kerala government.
Senior advocate Raju Ramachandran, appearing for the petitioners, however, said it was not a question of political opinion but of hate speech.
Justice Khanna said the fact of the matter was that all these materials must have been known to the Collegium. “It appears not,” responded Ramachandran referring to Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud’s statement Monday that “the Collegium has taken cognisance of what was drawn to our attention or came to our notice after we formulated our recommendations on the recommendation of the…Collegium of the Madras High Court”.
“The consultative process has certainly taken place. All that you are saying is this particular information may not be available… Actually, the assumption is all these factors would have been considered,” said Justice Khanna.
“And the process originates from the high court…two senior-most judges of the high court. You presume they are not aware of the antecedents of a candidate before they make up their minds,” said Justice Gavai.
Senior advocate Anand Grover, also appearing for the petitioners, said while they (high court judges) would be aware of the antecedents in terms of personal conduct, what a person says on YouTube or interview may not be known.
“Can Your Lordships not envisage that in a very rare case, information may not have been available to Collegium And this is one of those rare cases,” he asked.
Ramachandracn said the Collegium recommendations were on January 17, whereas the material against Advocate Gowri came to light on February 1, and a representation was addressed to the Collegium. He contended that the warrant was issued in a hurry.
But Justice Khanna said, “The recommendations were sometime about 21 days ago. You yourself are saying whatever you wanted to represent, you made the representation on February 1. We are on the 7th today…If any member of the Collegium had any reservation or anything, they would have taken it up.”
“What you are suggesting is that the court on the judicial side should ask the Collegium to reconsider…We can’t do that”, he added.
Ramachandran said he was not asking the court to issue a writ to the Collegium but only to take judicial notice that the Collegium is still in the process of considering the representation against Gowri, and that has been disclosed to us in open court proceedings.
“We have a very fairly robust scrutiny process… Let’s not interfere with this… Assuming that the Collegium may not have taken all those facts into account. That may not be appropriate,” added Justice Khanna.
