The Punjab Government sacked 46 bureaucrats last month purely because they were all appointed under the dispensation of R.P.S. Sidhu, who has himself been suspended as chairman of the public service commission. But this systemic cleansing, paradoxically, did not extend to any of the high court judges figuring in the same recruitment scam. The system has displayed its intolerance of scam-tainted bureaucrats but when it comes to judges similarly compromised, the bar seems to have been lowered. Indeed, Punjab has reversed the universally accepted principle that the higher your position, the higher the standards of behaviour that would apply to you. The ongoing controversy over Sidhu’s patronage network has emerged as a test case for dealing with this self-serving paradox of the Indian judiciary. All the more so because, in a remarkable display of public spirit, the bar and the media have pursued the issue vigorously, outraged as they have been by devious attempts to cover up the alleged complicity of high court judges in the scam. The sequence of events is revealing in itself. It all began on May 1 when The Indian Express reported that the disclosures made by Sidhu’s touts show that judges were among the persons who received undue favours from him. But out of deference to their high status, this newspaper desisted at that stage from naming the judges concerned. But two days later, on Sidhu’s petition, Justice K.S. Garewal passed a gag order prohibiting the government and the police from divulging any more details from the statements made by those touts. This provoked the bar to hold a meeting on May 6 denouncing Garewal’s gag order and demanding that the names of the judges implicated in the scam be made public. Subsequently, The Indian Express came up with the names after contacting the judges concerned for their defence. As for the gag order, a two-judge bench of the high court vacated it on May 31 and acknowledged that the media reports on Sidhu’s case did not violate his right to a free and fair trial. Another blatant attempt to shield the tainted judges is however yet to be redressed. The press revealed that even after it became a hotly debated scandal, the vigilance department investigating the case seemed to be engaged in a cover-up. This is because the formal confessional statement given by Sidhu’s tout, Randhir Singh Gill alias Dheera, on May 16 skipped almost half the names - 31 of the 63 - he gave a month earlier to the intelligence department, which did all the spade work of the case. The confession recorded at the instance of the vigilance department made no reference to any of the earlier mentioned high court judges. When the bar met again on May 20, angry lawyers alleged that the names of the judges were dropped under pressure. The vigilance department has so far shown no sign of taking Dheera again to a magistrate for recording a supplementary confessional statement naming the judges. It was against the backdrop of these unsavoury developments that the chief justice of the high court, Justice Arun Saharya, indicated to the bar that, regardless of the contents of Dheera’s formal confession, he was conducting an inquiry into the role of at least three of his colleagues who are alleged to have received undue favours from Sidhu. The evidence against each of them is too serious to be ignored. • Justice M.L. Singhal: His daughter topped the examination for selecting dental demonstrators. Sidhu’s tout, Jagman Singh, named Singhal. Jagman Singh needs to be taken seriously because it was after all at his instance that the police made the sensational discovery of Sidhu’s locker containing Rs 8.5 cr in hard cash. • Justice Amarbir Singh Gill: His daughter also topped her examination, which was for recruitment to the judicial branch of the Punjab civil service. He was named by Dheera. More importantly, it has come out that the answersheet of Gill’s daughter is rather illegible. • Justice Mehtab Singh Gill: He has been named by both Jagman Singh and Dheera. As old friends, Gill and Sidhu are alleged to have had frequent social contact. Therefore, Gill’s alleged involvment is not limited to getting jobs for others. He is said to have also promised and tried to provide legal help to Sidhu. The bar has been demanding that the chief justice should immediately withdraw work from the scam-tainted judges. Saharya, however, has no power to deny work to a judge or take any kind of disciplinary action against him. If Justice V. Ramaswami proceeded on leave in 1990 in the wake of a financial scandal, it was only because the then Chief Justice of India, Sabyasachi Mukharji, requested him to do so. The report that Saharya is planning to send to the Chief Justice of India may lead to nowhere because Parliament is the only disciplinary authority prescribed in the Constitution. The Ramaswami case has again shown how ineffective Parliament has been in this regard. The Punjab scam highlights the need for evolving a more practical system of judicial accountability.
