CPM leader, M V Jayarajan jailed for 6 months for contempt of court

KOCHI: CPM leader and state committee member MV Jayarajan has been sentenced to 6 months imprisonment by the Kerala High Court for contempt of court. The verdict was given by a division bench comprising Justice V Ramkumar and PQ Barkath Ali. Following the verdict Jayarajan was taken to the Poojappura central jail in Thiruvananthapuram.

Apart from 6 months imprisonment, Jayarajan has to pay a fine of Rs 2000. The CPM leader attracted the maximum punishment in a contempt of court case following defamatory remarks he made about the judiciary in a public speech in June 2010.

He was speaking against a high court verdict banning public meetings and demonstration on roads. Jayarajan’s plea to suspend the sentence to enable him to appeal in the higher court was turned down.

Immediately after the order was passed, police personnel arrived at the court and took him to Thiruvananthapuram Central Jail. The division bench held that by making the offending speech at Kannur last year, Jayarajan was ridiculing two high court judges and making “scurrilous, offensive , vicious and malicious onslaught on the higher judiciary, that too beyond controllable limits.”

It held Jayarajan, a former MLA from Kannur, guilty under Section 12 of the Contempt of Court Act. Delivering the 137-page judgement, the bench said there were occasions, when after seeking personal exemption from the court, Jayarajan was seen live on TV making denigrating statements against the court.

“The conduct amounts to tending to substantially interfering with the due course of justice coming in the meaning of contempt of court,” the bench said. “Any act creating a wrong impression in the minds of people regarding the fairness of judicial functionary is as such nature that substantially interferes or tends to interfere with justice. Hence, he deserves to be punished and does not deserve any leniency in the punishment,” the bench observed.

The high court had suo motu launched the contempt proceedings. According to Jayarajan, he had only criticised the judgement of the high court as it ‘violated’ the right to conduct roadside meetings enjoyed by the public for centuries. There is no law preventing such meetings, Jayarajan had submitted claiming there was widespread protest against the verdict.