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As collegium member, HC judge cleared names last year. Now he wants them recalled

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Punjab & Haryana HC judge Ajay Kumar Mittal wrote to the Union law minister on 30 May saying some of the names don’t merit appointment as high court judges.

New Delhi: The senior-most judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court has objected to the names recommended for judgeship by the high court collegium late last year, raising eyebrows inside and outside the judiciary.

Justice Ajay Kumar Mittal was a part of the three-member collegium that had unanimously recommended these names. The other members were then Chief Justice S.J. Vazifdar, who retired in May, and Justice Surya Kant.

The high court collegium had recommended the names of 11 lawyers — seven from Punjab and four from Haryana — and three judicial officers for elevation to the high court bench.

Uncertainty prevails over what prompted him to distance himself from the recommendations six months after they were made. There is also no clarity on whether he consulted Justice Surya Kant, the only other member of the collegium still in office, on the issue.

What has raised more questions is the fact that Mittal expressed his disapproval directly to the union law minister. The letter to the government, dated 30 May, was written two days before he was to demit office as the acting chief justice, with the new Chief Justice, Krishna Murari, taking oath on 2 June.

In the letter, sources told ThePrint, Mittal sought a re-examination of the names. He reportedly said some of the recommendations didn’t merit appointment as high court judges.

Power of collegium

“This is highly improper. When you have sat in the collegium meeting where the names were discussed and cleared, how can you now distance yourself from the same names now?” said a former Chief Justice of India.

“Also, the names were recommended by the collegium, of which he was a member. Once the names have been recommended, the collegium has no power to reconsider the names on its own. It can, at best, communicate the new material or facts, if any have emerged… to the SC collegium for necessary action,” the former CJI added, saying, “Justice Mittal couldn’t have sent such a communication on his own.”

As first reported by ThePrint, in January, the Supreme Court collegium had cited Mittal’s “unsatisfactory performance as judge” and an old adverse Intelligence Bureau report to ignore his seniority and recommend Justice Surya Kant for appointment as Chief Justice of the Himachal Pradesh High Court.

Two senior members of the collegium — Justice Jasti Chelameswar and Justice Ranjan Gogoi — had recorded detailed reasons for why Mittal should not be made chief justice.

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