Lawyers' associations condemns judges press meet, request CJI to address grievance

New Delhi, Jan 14
The Co-ordination Committee of All District Bar Associations of Delhi on Sunday condemned the act of the four senior Supreme Court judges in going public over their differences with Chief Justice Dipak Misra but requested him to address their grievance immediately.

The co-ordination committee said that it is pained about the incident that took place on January 12 where four senior most apex court judges - J. Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan B. Lokur and Kurian Joseph - held an unprecedented press conference,ssaying the administration of the top court was "not in order".

"We condemn the act of the four senior most SC judges," the committee said in a statement, but requested CJI to address the grievances of the four senior judges immediately.

The bar associations suggested that judges should have adopted other good and healthy options like approaching the Supreme Court Bar Association, senior advocates or the President.

"The statement of the four judges has given the impression that the junior Supreme Court Judges are not competent enough," the committee said.

"We feel that all Supreme Court judges have equal integrity and the equally competent."

The bar associations opined that media acting as the fourth pillar of democracy should have maintained the sanctity of the third pillar of democracy while reporting such a grave issue and expressed that "there is a grave fear of Supreme Court becoming center of political slugfest."

"The people of India have big faith in the sacred institution and the said faith should not be even touched by any act of anyone and judicial discipline should be maintained at any cost," the statement said.

"We hereby request the Chief Justice of India and all other judges of Supreme Court to put their house in order. We believe that this incident occurred in absences of any legal mechanism to resolve such type of disputes."

The lawyer body said that if these activities persist then the lawyers fraternity will be compelled to start a movement for rectification and eradication of anomalies and evils prevailing in the judicial system, as they are the trustee and the custodians of the legal systems.