P Sathasivam
Former CJI P Sathasivam was today sworn in as governor of Kerala, as the first ex-CJI to have been appointed to a state’s governorship.
The Bombay Lawyers Association wrote to Chief Justice of India RM Lodha about an incident alleged by senior counsel Dushyant Dave in March about Supreme Court Justice CK Prasad hearing and deciding on a property matter listed before another bench himself: "We expected some response to our letter but unfortunately our expectations were belied. It is possible that at the end of his tenure, Chief Justice Sathasivam was hard-pressed for time and could not give the necessary attention to our request." [DNA]
Rights lawyer Monalisa argues that the former Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam introduced a seldom-seen sensitivity into the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence and culture, though one major opportunity was clearly missed.
Court Witness does former Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam and asks, was he great? Or merely safe?
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam, who retires tomorrow to make way for Justice RM Lodha as CJI, said that a constitution bench will look into whether the commuted death sentence of the seven conspiring assassins of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, should mean they will continue to be imprisoned for life or released by the Tamil Nadu government. [TOI] [Download judgment]
Journalist @spread_law tweeted: "Matter referred to Constitution Bench of not less than 5 judges. The Constitution bench to decide what is the extent of state's power when it comes to remission of a person who is convicted under a central law. And whether court can cut down the power of state Government to remit sentence by way of a judicial order."
@sankararaman tweeted that it was a "clear example of chickening out. No judge wants to be remembered as the one who ordered release of ex-PM's assassins".
@suhrith wrote that "a reference to a constitutional bench is fine if there is a substantial question to be decided. Not sure there is one here" and @CourtWitness1 added: "What stupidity is this from the Supreme Court? How is a writ petition by the Central Govt even maintainable?!!"
The founder director of NLSIU Bangalore, NR Madhavan Menon, ex Lok Sabha secretary general TK Vishwanathan and senior counsel Ranjit Kumar have been appointed by the Supreme Court to form a committee regulating government departments advertising with an "obvious political message".
Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam said today that existing guidelines did not cover such cases, and that the committee should submit its report to the apex court in three months. [IANS] [Read judgment (PDF)]
The Supreme Court sexual harassment committee has banned an advocate from the Supreme Court premises for six months for an incident of sexual harassment.
The Supreme Court has ordered a retrospective amendment in the High Court Judges Rules 1956, to standardise all retired higher judiciary judges’ pension. The SC has also directed those states which have not yet extended various post-retirement benefits to retired higher judiciary judges, to do so within six months.
A Supreme Court bench of CJI P Sathasivam, and Justices RM Lodha, HL Dattu and Sudhansu Jyoti Mukhopadhaya, commuted the death penalty of 1993 Delhi bomb blast convict Devender Pal Singh Bhullar to life imprisonment, citing its earlier Shatrughan Chauhan decision.
The Supreme Court has said that the police should take action in the gang-rape of a woman in a village, which was allegedly ordered by a village panchayat as punishment for her affair. The bench led by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam was apparently able to do little substantively in the case, beyond order the WB government to pay Rs 5 lakh in compensation, but reiterated the Lalita Kumari guidelines that police must register an FIR on congisable offences and that hospitals must provide free medical assistance to victims of certain offences. "We implore upon the State machinery to work in harmony with each other to safeguard the rights of women in our country," he said.
Amicus curiae and additional solicitor general Sidharth Luthra assisted the court, which took notice of the case after reading newspaper reports about it. [Judgment]
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) P Sathasivam has ruled in a writ petition on people disposing human waste manually from dry toilets, granting Rs 10 lakh compensation each to families of manual scavengers who died in sewers, manholes or septic tanks since 1993, after the work was outlawed by law, which was further strengthened in September of last year.
The SC also ordered better schemes for rehabilitation of workers who would be doing an illegal job under the law, and told the Indian Railways, which is the largest employer of manual scavengers, of whom the majority are from the dalit castes, to stop the practice. [Mint] [Judgment W.P.(C) 583/2003] [January NYT feature on the manual scavenging law]
The Supreme Court has slammed the Uttar Pradesh government for failing to prevent the Muzaffarnagar riots in September 2013.
"After two wasted years, Sathasivam realizes that Kapadia was, after all, right about the Registry," tweeted CourtWitness. Livelaw reported that Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sathasivam said at an AOR-hosted function yesterday that the registry was not listing matters correctly by allowing lawyers to mention matters, following controversy kicked off by senior advocate Dushyant Dave about forum shopping, which the CJI had attributed to a mistake in the registry [@CourtWitness1] [LiveLaw]
Madras High Court Advocates Association (MHAA) president Paul Kanagaraj, with an MHAA “delegation”, met Tamil Nadu governor K Rosaiah seeking his intervention in recalling a list of 12 names recommended for judgeship at the HC, and taking exception to the fact that the recommended advocates were “shortlisted by the collegium on the interference of the Chief Justice of India”, reported the Deccan Chronicle.
Meanwhile the HC’s justice CS Karnan wrote to the National Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes seeking action against chief justice RK Aggarwal for “changing his portfolio [of cases] from Karur to Sivanga”.
Legally India delved into the polico-cultural climate at the Madras Bar, a lot of which apparently revolves around casteism.{jcomments off}
Publicity shy CJI: The Chief Justice of India P Sathasivam refused permission to publish his photograph in a September advertisement for the release of India’s first customised PIN code for the apex court, an RTI has revealed [PTI]
Lower court jurisdiction enhancement: The Delhi government is giving final shape to a proposal to enhance Delhi’s lower courts’ pecuniary jurisdiction from Rs 20 lakh to Rs 2 crore, to reduce burden on the Delhi HC [PTI]
Prosecutorial vacancies ad inept: Prosecutors decried the Delhi government advertisement for 20 prosecutorial vacancies as an ad-hoc measure that is bound to fail. The ad, which comes a month after the Delhi HC’s direction to the government to fill prosecutorial vaclawyerancies, stated that only retired prosecuting officers and assistant public prosecutors with at least 2 years in the post could apply [Indian Express]
Delhi law min bad PR salvage: Delhi law minister Somnath Bharti attempted to rebut bad press that followed yesterday’s reports by a an ex-judge accusing him of professional misconduct, while he was practising as a lawyer. Bharti released a press statement saying that he “had let go of [his] disagreement with lower court and then HC’s orders/judgements” because after his then-client already got bail, there was no reason left to challenge the order [TOI]
Pendency spiral: MJ Antony takes a look at arrears and incidental matters: All Indian courts: 32 million pending cases; SC – 66,349; Delhi HC – over 1,20,000 cases. Another commentator bemoans that the SC has stopped publishing its quarterly review Court News regularly after 2009. Also adds that 10 out of 29 current judges are retiring in the next few months, this year will see three chief justices, the Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2013 will be shelved and tribunal vacancies are a different tale altogether [Business Standard]
Those who are accusing the Supreme Court of washing its hands of the allegation that a former apex court judge sexually harassed a former intern (“SJ”), have it wrong.
CJI Sathasivam has released an excerpt of the judicial inquiry report into the #InternJudge sex harassment allegations against retired Justice AK Ganguly, which acknowledged a “prima facie” case.