Medical bribery: SC reserves SIT order

The Supreme Court reserved on Monday its order on a plea seeking a court-monitored probe by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) in the medical bribery  scam matter which involves judges from the higher judiciary.

After hearing arguments submitted by Attorney General KK Venugopal and advocate Prashant Bhushan -- who represents the NGO Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms which filed the petition, a special bench comprising Justices RK Agrawal, Arun Mishra and AM Khanwilkar reserved the order for December 1.

Venugopal had submitted that the PIL as misconceived and called the arguments made by Bhushan -- who said that he wanted to protect the independence of the judiciary, disingenuous.

Bhushan said that all aspects were not covered by the apex court its earlier verdict -- when it had junked a similar petition filed by senior advocate Kamini Jaiswal, that he has filed this petition to save the “dignity, independence and integrity of the judiciary.”

Earlier this month, Bhushan’s CJAR and Jaiswal had filed identical petitions on two consecutive days causing an uproar in the apex court. During their arguments, both petitions categorically sought the recusal of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra who had deliberated on matters where Prasad Education Trust - one of the petitioners, is also an accused in the medical scam case which the CBI is probing.

In short order, the top court had junked Jaiswal’s petition calling the attempts made by her and Bhushan as “forum-shopping, contemptuous, unethical, derogatory.” The bench, however, had stopped short of initiating contempt of court proceedings against them, in the interest and “welfare of the great institution.”

‘MISCONCEIVED’

• Attorney General KK Venugopal said the PIL demanding an SIT was “misconceived”. He called the argument that the PIL wanted to protect the independence of the judiciary as “disingenuous”