The Bar Council termed the collegium’s recommendations ‘unjust and improper’, but the Centre has cleared the names.
New Delhi: Even as the Bar Council of India (BCI) Wednesday termed the Supreme Court collegium’s controversial decision to recommend the names of Karnataka high court chief justice Dinesh Maheshwari and Delhi high court Judge Sanjiv Khanna for elevation to the top court “unjust and improper”, the Centre has cleared the names.
Formal orders, appointing the two as judges of the Supreme Court, were issued Wednesday evening.
“We have processed the names and there was no request from the CJI not to process them. The warrants of appointment have been issued,” sources told ThePrint.
The latest development comes even as BCI chairman Manan Kumar Mishra said a delegation of the council will soon meet all members of the collegium to ask them to “recall their decision/recommendation” of 10 January.
Last week, the top court rescinded its earlier decision to elevate Delhi high court chief justice Rajendra Menon and Rajasthan high court chief justice Pradeep Nandrajog to the Supreme Court.
“The supercession of several senior judges and chief justices of the country can’t be tolerated by the people of the country. The revocation of the earlier decision recommending the names of Justice Pradip Nandrajog and Justice Rajendra Menon is viewed as whimsical and arbitrary,” said the (BCI) statement.
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Criticism
The decision of the collegium has drawn widespread criticism.
In recommending Justice Khanna’s name, the five-judge SC collegium superceded three judges from the same parent high court senior to him — Nandrajog, Jammu and Kashmir high court chief justice Gita Mittal and Delhi high court judge Ravindra Bhat.
After its move, Supreme Court judge S.K. Kaul also raised questions over the manner in which judges senior to Justice Khanna were being ignored to elevate him.
The BCI statement comes a day after former Delhi high court judge Kailash Gambhir flagged the recommendations, as he wrote to President Ram Nath Kovind and urged him to intervene.
In his letter, Gambhir referred to the manner in which the Indira Gandhi government had superceded Justice Khanna’s uncle Justice H.R. Khanna during Emergency to deny him the post of Chief Justice of India over a dissenting judgment in a habeas corpus case.
“It will be another black day when there will be supercession of 32 judges who are senior to Justice Sanjeev Khanna and many of them may be no less meritorious and men of integrity than him,” Gambhir wrote.
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Possibly the least time ever taken to approve a recommendation of the Collegium.