A majority of the executive committee members of the Supreme Court Bar Association today dissociated themselves from the response of its President and Vice President in condemning the alleged "derogatory" remarks of senior advocate Dushyant Dave concerning the Chief Justice of India and the Collegium.
The statement issued by 13 out of the 21 members of the executive committee (EC) claimed that the response sent by the SCBA president, vice president and secretary was done without holding any meeting or deliberating the issue in its proper perspective.
The members said they do not subscribe to the views of the three top office-bearers of the lawyers' body in condemning the "scurrilous and baseless personal attack".
However, SCBA Vice President and senior advocate Ajit Kumar Sinha said "the grievance of the members is that they were not consulted before taking decision as it was done during court vacations. We are holding a meeting tomorrow and we will resolve this issue."
Dave, a former SCBA president, had on September 27 levelled certain charges against the CJI and the Collegium on a TV talkshow over the issue of the resignation by Karnataka High Court Justice Jayant Patel following his transfer to the Allahabad High Court.
Justice Patel was part of a division bench of the Gujarat High Court that had ordered a CBI probe into the Ishrat Jahan encounter in 2011. He had served as the acting chief justice of Gujarat High Court before being transferred to the Karnataka High Court.
In today's statement, the 13 EC members condemned the "unilateral action" and dissociated themselves from the statement issued by the president, VP and secretary, saying this was done in their "personal capacity".
"The undersigned Executive Committee members of SCBA are shocked at the response sent by SCBA president, vice president and hony secretary dated September 28 condemning, interalia certain statements attributed to Dushyant Dave, senior advocate concerning Chief Justice of India," the members said.
Earlier, the three SCBA office-bearers had condemned the statement of Dave, saying, "he has been in the habit of targetting successive Chief Justices of India in the recent past without any basis".
The Bar Council of India, the apex body of lawyers, had also issued a show cause notice to him over his remarks saying the council has taken "serious notice" of Dave's "derogatory comments and reckless remarks against the CJI and the Collegium" and would take further action after the reply of the senior advocate.
Dave, on other hand, had defended his statements on the TV show, asserting that whatever he had said was the "truth" and "it is a matter of concern for all in legal system and the nation that such conduct of judges go unchecked".
He had said what worried him as a citizen and a lawyer was that "the executive is bound to exploit the situation especially when the Supreme Court today has to deal with highly political matters of far-reaching consequence".
Justice Patel, who was the second senior-most judge in the Karnataka High Court had recently resigned after being transferred to Allahabad High Court. He was tipped to become the chief justice of Karnataka high court after incumbent S N Mukherjee retires on October 9.
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