In Jaya8217;s service

Rarely has a technical plea sounded less tenable than the one trotted out by Union Law Minister M. Thambidurai in justification of the su...

Rarely has a technical plea sounded less tenable than the one trotted out by Union Law Minister M. Thambidurai in justification of the summary dismissal8217; of Justice C. Shivappa of the Madras High Court. He claims to have discovered that the judge had fudged his date of birth and thus overstayed his tenure on the Bench. Hence the fax message from the AIADMK8217;s advocate in the Union Cabinet to the court, unceremoniously announcing Shivappa8217;s alleged superannuation.

The truly clinching argument against the unorthodox move is, again, not technical. It is not only that the Madras High Court had already decided the case once in the judge8217;s favour. And, certainly questionable is the authority of a mere minister to terminate by means of telecommunication the services of someone appointed to an august constitutional office by the President.

All the more so for the fact a case closed earlier by the President had been reopened for a stated reason that would strike few as compellingly grave. None of this, however, iswhat makes the move by Jayalalitha8217;s man in New Delhi an unacceptable assault on the judiciary, on the independence and integrity of the one institution of our system with its image still largely intact. What does so is the ugly political truth behind the technicality, the ill-concealed motive behind the imperiously delivered message.

It is not any birth date but a bail decision, as Tamil Nadu8217;s common observer would see it, that appears to rankle with Thambidurai and his political camp. Justice Shivapppa did not endear himself to the Jayalalitha fan clubs when he rejected her anticipatory bail application, with the result that the former Chief Minister had to spend a few months in jail.

Nor when he found against her a prima facie case of corruption, for which the people had found it fit to hand her a resounding electoral punishment.

This was not the first time the long hand of the Union Law Ministry reached into the affairs of the state8217;s judiciary. Former Chief Justice of the Madras High Court M.S.Liberhans, who had shown similarly scant reverence for the Puratchi Thalaivi, found himself transferred not long ago. The context cannot but make the sack order served on Justice Shivappa seem the continuation of a sordid Central campaign. The fax of impertinent flippancy would not seem an illogical sequel to the Central government8217;s earlier fiat to special courts hearing cases against Jayalalitha to pack and leave.

The Central leaders, particularly of the Bharatiya Janata Party, have repeatedly asserted their respect for the judiciary and promised to let the law take its course in the corruption cases involving an important ally. Thambidurai8217;s tactics, pursued with tacit BJP support, have not exactly served to enhance the credibility of such claims. Especially considering that each of the counter-judiciary compromises and concessions has come in the wake of some loud sulking by the lady and hurried efforts by high-profile coalition leaders to pacify and placate her.

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It is time to end this tamasha8217;. Atstake is not merely the image of the BJP and the political bloc it heads. Even the compulsions of coalition politics cannot be allowed to endanger the strength and standing of the judiciary.