SC judges against CJI: Contentious cases that started it all

How a medical college management worked the legal system

A bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra on November 10, annulled the decision of a bench headed by Justice Jasti Chelameswar to constitute a Constitution Bench to hear the plea into the alleged bribery case involving retired Orissa High Court judge IM Quddusi.

The retired judge had allegedly used his influence in the top court to get favourable orders for a college.

The bone of contention was the argument between the counsel and the CJI himself on whether he out to have recused himself from hearing the petition.

Intra-court appeals

CJI Misra has gone against orders passed by Justices Adarsh Goel and UU Lalit. One  case relates to the protracted stand-off between the central government and judiciary over finalising the MoP (In November 2017, the SC observed that top judicial appointments were not matters to be discussed in a public forum). The second one was a matter related to the possibility of an alternate forum to decide criminal appeals without delays. The third was on the issue of arrests in dowry cases.

Fissures in the Collegium

On December 20, it had emerged that Justices Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph had penned two letters expressing their reservations on the issue of publication of the collegium’s resolutions. In a bid to make the processes transparent, the top court Collegium led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra on October 6 passed a resolution wherein the decisions taken by them would be uploaded online “to ensure transparency and yet maintain confidentiality in the Collegium system”.