Senior Lawyers Who Belong To A Particular Ideology Pressurising Court: Justice SN Dhingra Cites Kapil Sibal's Actions As Reason For Letter By 21 Retired Judges To CJI

Justice SN Dhingra, a former Judge of the Delhi High Court has said that the actions of Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal prompted the twenty-one retired judges to write a letter to the Chief Justice of India warning about attempts to undermine the judiciary. Justice Dhingra is a signatory to that letter. 

In an interview with the PTI, Justice Dinghra referred to Sibal's remark before the Supreme Court, after his client did not get the relief he was expecting, that "The history of this Court will not be written in golden words", when he was asked as to what prompted the former Judges to write the letter. 

"There is a lobby of lawyers is active in the Supreme Court which tries to pressurise Judges of the Supreme Court through statements given outside court, interviews to TV channels, writing articles in newspapers. Pressure is built against the Supreme Court by saying that the present decisions of the Supreme Court are not correct, that there is a danger to democracy. They try to create such a narrative to demean the Supreme Court. We have seen that many Senior Advocates who belong to a particular ideology or represent a particular Party, when decisions are not to their liking, instead of telling what is wrong with the decision, without telling what is legally wrong with the Judgment......... Even in the Court, they make extra-judicial arguments, not legal arguments- that so and so will happen in politics, the country will break- such arguments are made to put pressure on the Court as if the Country is in some great difficulty and it is for these lawyers to the save the country. We realised this and we wrote the letter", Justice Dhingra said. 

When asked about a specific incident with led to the reaction by retired Judges, Justice Dhingra referred to Kapil Sibal's aforesaid remarks in the Supreme Court.

Earlier, around 600 lawyers from across the country, including prominent Senior Advocates Harish Salve, Vivek Sood, Kriti Uppal, Manan Kumar Mishra, Adish Aggarwala, Chetan Mittal, Pinky Anand, Archana Pathak Dave, Hitesh Jain, Ujjwala Pawar, Uday Holla, Swaroopama Chaturvedi, S. Ravi, SD Sanjay and MB Nargund had written a letter to Chief Justice DY Chandrachud expressing their concern in the manner in which “vested interest group” is trying to pressure and influence the judicial process and defame the courts based on stale political agendas.

Responding to the said letter, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had written on social media, "To browbeat and bully others is vintage Congress culture. 5 decades ago itself they had called for a "committed judiciary" - they shamelessly want commitment from others for their selfish interests but desist from any commitment towards the nation. No wonder 140 crore Indians are rejecting them.”

In the letter by the 21 retired Judges including four former Judges of the Apex Court, the CJI was told that "The practice of selectively praising judicial decisions that align with one's views while vehemently criticizing those that do not, undermines the very essence of judicial review and the rule of law".

The four retired Judges of the Supreme Court who are signatories to the letter are Justice Deepak Verma, Justice Krishna Murari, Justice Dinesh Maheshwari and Justice MR Shah.