‘VESTED INTEREST GROUP PUTTING PRESSURE ON JUDICIARY’: HARISH SALVE, 600 LAWYERS WRITE TO CJI

Around 600 lawyers, including senior advocate Harish Salve and Bar Council of India chairperson Manan Kumar Mishra, have written to Chief Justice DY Chandrachud expressing “deepest concern” about the actions of a “vested interest group”, alleging that it is trying to “pressure the judiciary” and “influence judicial process”.

The letter said that these “groups” are attempting to tarnish the reputation of courts with “frivolous logic and stale political agendas.”

“Their antics are vitiating the atmosphere of trust and harmony, which characterises the functioning of the judiciary. Their pressure tactics are most obvious in political cases, particularly those involving political figures accused of corruption” and “are damaging to our courts and threaten our democratic fabric”, the letter said.

“This heated interest group operates in various ways. They create false narratives of a supposed ‘better past’ and ‘golden period’ of the courts, contrasting it with the happenings in the present. These are nothing but intentional statements, made to sway court decisions and to embarrass the courts for certain political gains”.

The group of lawyers, who are behind the letter titled “Judiciary Under Threat-Safeguarding Judiciary from Political and Professional Pressure”, number around 600 and also include Adish Aggarwala, Chetan Mittal, Pinky Anand, Hitesh Jain, Ujjwala Pawar, Uday Holla and Swarupama Chaturvedi, the official sources said, reports PTI.

Though the lawyers behind the letter have mentioned no specific cases, the development comes at a time when courts are dealing with several high-profile criminal cases of corruption involving opposition leaders.

They have also concocted an entire theory of “bench fixing” which is not just disrespectful and contemptuous but an attack on the honour and dignity of courts, the letter said.

“They have also stooped to the level of comparing our courts to those countries where there is no rule of law and accusing our judicial institutions with unfair practices,” it said.

These critics have adopted the “my way or the highway” approach at work as they hail the decisions they agree with, but any decision they disagree with, is trashed, smeared and disregarded, they said.

“This two-faced behaviour is harmful to the respect a common man should have for our legal system,” the letter said and claimed that this cherry picking has been visible in very recent judgments too.

They urged the Supreme Court to stand strong and take steps to protect courts from these alleged attacks.

“Staying silent or doing nothing could accidentally give more power to those who mean to do harm. This is not the time to maintain dignified silence as such efforts are happening since few years and too frequently.”

The lawyers said, “As people who work to uphold the law, we think it’s time to stand up for our courts. We need to come together and speak out against these underhanded attacks, making sure our courts stay strong as pillars of our democracy, untouched by these calculated attacks.”

2024-03-28T10:48:16Z dg43tfdfdgfd