The Delhi high court has asked the lower court judge who had granted bail to Unitech's promoters in April to retire early effective yesterday.

Additional district and sessions judge Raj Kapoor, who was posted in the Patiala House court, was relieved from his post yesterday, by order of Delhi high court chief justice Gita Mittal.

According to authoritative sources in the Delhi high court, the decision was taken in a full court meeting of the Delhi high court last week, in which three lower court judges' service records were reviewed. The source explained that the high court reviews lower court judges' service records when they reach the age of 58, as a matter of procedure.

Based on the service record the HC either allows the lower court judges to continue in their post until they attain the age of 60, or asks them to retire immediately.

Kapoor was the only one of the three reviewed judges who was asked to retire in this round, said the source.

Kapoor had on 10 April granted three months interim bail to the promoters of Unitech, one day after they were arrested for alleged cheating and fraud in a Gurgaon-based real estate project, PTI had reported.

In June, the Delhi high court's registrar (vigilance) seized three computers of the Patiala House sessions court for forensic analysis to determine whether the judgments pronounced by one particular judge of the Patiala House sessions court had been written on those computers or not, reported Hindi newspaper Dainik Jagran adding that the action was taken on complaints alleging corruption against that judge.

Jagran's report, translated into English by the blog Latest Laws states that the judgments pronounced by the accused judge were allegedly written in undue haste and that “there were other allegations of Corruption against this particular Judge as lately he had granted Bail to a Builder arrested by the Police for Cheating the investors in Delhi- NCR.”

Kapoor was not reachable for comment at the time of going to press.