The all-powerful Supreme Court seems to have no respite from the information watchdog. The Central Information Commission (CIC) that hit headlines for asking judges to disclose assets has now asked the top legal forum to disclose the name of the Union minister who allegedly put pressure on a Madras high court judge.
Justice R Regupathy created a flutter in June when he declared in the open court that a minister in the Manmohan Singh government had approached him to grant pre-arrest bail to Dr Kishnamoorthy and his son S Kirub Shridhar, a third year student in a private medical college in Puducherry. The father son duo faces the charge of forging Shridhar’s mark-sheet. They had pleaded for anticipatory bail in the case filed by CBI.
Later, Justice Regupathy backtracked, saying no minister had approached him but a lawyer had talked to him. But, the media named communication minister A Raja of the DMK. Raja stoutly denied the charge and the issue died a slow death.
However, Subhash Chandra Agrawal, an RTI enthusiast, has approached the CIC seeking vital information about the minister-judge connection. It was due to Agrawal’s sustained efforts that the Supreme Court judges recently disclosed their assets.
This time, Agrawal has drawn the commission’s attention towards CJI KG Balakrishnan’s statement in the press where he said justice Regupathy wrote to the chief justice of Madras high court saying the minister had not spoken to him directly. After a detailed hearing, CIC asked the top court’s CPIO to provide the requisite information to Agrawal within a fortnight.
The commission does not feel that disclosure of name or correspondence sought by Agrawal would “in any way infringe on the constitutional stature of honourable justices of the high court or indeed in any way diminish the exalted status.”
On Wednesday, the CIC passed another significant order on Agrawal’s plea for disclosure of the reasons for appointing three judges — justices RM Lodha, HL Dattu and AK Ganguly — and denying three senior HC chief justices the chance to adore the apex court. CIC has asked CPIO to provide the required details that might disclose why why three senior chief justices — AP Shah, AK Patnaik and VK Gupta — were dropped.
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