Good Friday conference row raises head again in Supreme Court

NEW DELHI: The controversy over Justice Kurian Joseph’s objections to Chief Justice of India HL Dattu’s decision to have the biennial judges’ conference on Good Friday reared its head again in the Supreme Court on Thursday. This took place during the debate on the validity of the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC).

Justice Joseph joined issue when presiding judge Justice JS Khehar tried to brush off a resolution read out by senior advocate KK Venugopal drawing the bench’s attention to the fact that a conference preceding the 1993 ruling, under which the collegium system was created, had actually demanded that the CJI be given primacy in all judicial appointments.

“It was not a meeting of the judges of the Supreme Court. It was a meeting of the CJI, two senior most judges of the Supreme Court and Chief Justices of High Courts,” Justice Khehar observed, backing what was the CJI’s defence for holding the conference on Good Friday. Justice Jasti Chelameshwar seconded this when he added that only the CJI and two senior-most judges of the Supreme Court had to attend the meeting and that it was not meant for all judges. That was the position, at least from 1990, he maintained.

Justice Joseph, however, was quick to contradict Justice Khehar. “My brother is not correct. It was actually a conference of judges of Supreme Court and Chief Justices of High Courts,” he said. Venugopal agreed with him, noting he normally found judges of the Supreme Court at the dinners that followed such conferences.

Justice Khehar seized upon his remarks to comment that it still did not imply that the conferences required mandatory presence of all judges of the Supreme Court. “Attending dinners is something different,” Justice Khehar said. Justice Joseph was did not let this pass. “Judges of Supreme Court are not invited only for eating.

They are party to all these resolutions,” he said. The cross-observations raised quite a few eyebrows in the packed court room. The debate on the NJAC’s fate continued thereafter, with the attorney general and counsel for BJP-ruled states such as KK Venugopal and K Parasaran insisting that the matter be referred to an 11-judge bench for reconsideration of the earlier 1993 ruling.