Judge irked by Cong workers’ applause

Apparently angered by Congress workers cheering and clapping in the courtroom, Justice B J Sethna today flung the case papers and asked for the case to be heard by another bench.

A division bench of Justice Sethna and M C Patel was hearing a petition from three Congress candidates—Chinmay Vyas, Vasant Parmar and Chandrika Sanghani—whose nominations for the Ahmedabad municipal polls were rejected by the State Election Commission as signatures of their supporters were missing.

Their advocate alleged in the court that a BJP worker, Kamlesh Patel, had asked the election staff to ensure that the papers of Congress candidates were rejected.

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The judge also pulled up the state government counsel, where upon Congress workers raised slogans and started cheering and clapping.

Flinging the case papers, Justice Sethna passed a ‘‘not before me’’ order, requesting Chief Justice Bhavani Singh to assign the case to another bench.