Accusing Sikkim High Court Chief Justice P D Dinakaran of adopting delaying tactics, the Supreme Court today rejected his plea to invalidate the inquiry by a Rajya Sabha-appointed panel into his alleged corrupt practices and misconduct.
A bench of justices G S Singhvi and C K Prasad, however, asked the Rajya Sabha chairman and Vice President Hamid Ansari to replace one of the three members of the panel senior advocate P P Rao whose unbiasness was questioned by Dinakaran.
Holding that it was a “calculated” move on the part of Chief Justice of High Court to raise objection against Rao to delay the proceeding which is to be completed within three months, the bench said reconstitution of committee will not hamper the proceedings and it shall proceed on the charges already framed against the Judge.
“We hold that belated raising of objection against inclusion of Rao in the Committee appears to be a calculated move. He(Dinakaran) is an intelligent person and knows that the Presiding Officer of the Committee is required to forward the report within a period of three months from the date the charges framed under Section 3(3) of the Act were served upon him. Therefore, he wants to adopt every possible tactic to delay the submission of the report,” the bench said.
Dismissing his plea to invalidate the charges framed against him due to the presence of Rao in the Committee, the bench said, “This Court or, for that reason, no Court can render assistance to him in a petition filed with the sole object of delaying finalisation of the inquiry.”
“Therefore, nomination of another jurist will not hamper the proceedings of the Committee and the reconstituted Committee shall be entitled to proceed on the charges already framed against him,” the court said.
Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari had in January 2010 constituted the three-member panel to examine the 12 charges framed in the notice of motion adopted by the House.
