Now, SC judge recuses from hearing pleas in Narada case

New Delhi: Supreme Court judge justice Aniruddha Bose recused himself on Tuesday from hearing a case involving the West Bengal government, withdrawing from a matter on the appeals of chief minister Mamata Banerjee and the state’s law minister Moloy Ghatak linked to the Narada tapes case

New Delhi: Supreme Court judge justice Aniruddha Bose recused himself on Tuesday from hearing a case involving the West Bengal government, withdrawing from a matter on the appeals of chief minister Mamata Banerjee and the state’s law minister Moloy Ghatak linked to the Narada tapes case.

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In less than a week, two Supreme Court judges hailing from Kolkata have now withdrawn themselves from two politically sensitive cases involving the state government. On June 18, justice Indira Banerjee expressed “personal difficulties” in taking up a clutch of petitions related to post-poll violence in the state. Judges are not obligated to give reasons while opting out of hearing cases.

On Tuesday, three petitions were listed for hearing before a bench of justices Hemant Gupta and Bose to consider appeals by Banerjee, Ghatak and the state government against a Calcutta high court order of June 9. The high court refused to accept their affidavits in opposition to the Central Bureau of Investigation’s petition for transferring the Narada case from a trial court to itself.

The case pertains to a sting operation caught on camera, allegedly showing Trinamool Congress leaders accepting bribes. The TMC leaders have denied the charges.

The batch of cases was called out as the first matter in the apex court on Tuesday and justice Gupta passed the order releasing the matter from the bench. The order said that the matters needed to be listed before another bench, of which justice Bose is not a member. It also requested Chief Justice of India (CJI) NV Ramana to assign the cases to a different bench for hearing on the same day.

“These matters will be listed before some other bench. Justice Bose has some reservations in hearing them,” justice Gupta told solicitor general Tushar Mehta, who was appearing for CBI.

Justice Bose, who did not specify the reason behind his recusal, completed his education in Kolkata before he began practising there as a lawyer in 1985 and was elevated as a judge to the Calcutta high court in 2004. He became a judge in the Supreme Court in May 2019.

Justice Banerjee, on Friday last week, withdrew herself from a bunch of public interest litigations (PILs) alleging state-sponsored violence in West Bengal against Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers. These PILs demanded a court-monitored investigation either by CBI or by a special investigation team into allegations of rape, murder, assault and forceful displacement by Trinamool Congress workers.

When these matters came up before the bench of justices Banerjee and MR Shah on June 15, Mehta sought an adjournment and the cases were deferred to June 18. On June 18, however, justice Banerjee recused herself.

“I have some personal difficulty in hearing this,” justice Banerjee remarked while distancing herself from the adjudication of the matter. The judge did not elaborate on the reason for recusing from the case.

Justice Banerjee, the only woman judge in the Supreme Court at the moment, also completed her education from Kolkata, and practised law since 1985 before she was appointed as a judge in the Calcutta high court in 2002. She was elevated to the Supreme Court in August 2018.

In 2015, when a Constitution bench struck down the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC), one of the members of the bench, justice Kurian Joseph penned down a separate judgment to hold that judges must disclose reasons when they decide not to hear a case and ask it to be placed before another judge in that court.

Another judge on the NJAC bench, justice Madan B Lokur also said that questions over recusal were quite significant and since it appeared that such applications were gaining frequency, it was time that some procedural and substantive rules were framed in this regard.

However, the 2015 judgment has not brought about any significant change. There are no rules framed to guide the issue of recusal and judges have not been indicating broad reasons while choosing not to hear a case.

Former CJI KG Balakrishnan told HT: “It is up to the judges to decide whether they want to give reasons for recusal or not. There may be some embarrassing situations or facts that they may not be interested in explaining to the whole world. Giving reasons may lead to further embarrassments. Somebody could have a personal relationship with a party or some judge could have appeared as lawyers for someone.”