Judge Loya — the trigger for judiciary's biggest crisis

The plea seeking an independent investigation into the death of judge Loya is largely seen as an immediate trigger that incited the rebellion among four Supreme Court judges who held the unprecedented news conference on January 12, earlier this year.

The matter, which was initially heard by a bench comprising Justices Arun Mishra and MM Shantanagouder set off a series of events that resulted in the unprecedented crisis in India's judiciary.

The matter before a bench comprising of relatively junior apex court judges, was one of the immediate catalyst that led to Justices Jasti Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph accusing Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra of allocating sensitive and important matters to preferred benches.

Eight days after the news conference, the case was transferred before a bench led by CJI Misra. However, the transfer of the case from Court 10 to Court 1 raised eyebrows as well. The initial controversy was because it was listed before a 'preferred bench'. Though, legal experts now believed that with the CJI Misra-led bench hearing the case, there were concerns over alleged conflict of interest.

Four Supreme Court judges — the most senior of the court's 25 after the CJI — held a news conference on January 12 to bare their anguish over CJI Misra's alleged breach of institutional integrity, and "to save the democracy". At the news conference, when reporters asked whether the presser was related to the case of Loya, one of the four judges had said "yes".

At the presser, the four judges had admitted to speaking to their chief beforehand on numerous occasions. When CJI Misra allegedly did not listen to their impassioned pleas, they "took the difficult decision" to speak directly to the nation.

There, before media cameras, the four judges admitted that there was a lot that was wrong within the judges' lounge, but the catalyst for the presser was the allocation of Judge Loya's case to a relatively junior judge, Justice Arun Mishra.

The background

• In December 2014, Judge Loya died, allegedly of a cardiac arrest, in Nagpur while attending his friend's daughter's wedding. At the time of his death, he was presiding over the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case that had 22 accused, including BJP's Amit Shah.
• Shortly, after Loya's death, the case was transferred to another judge who then dismissed the charges.