NEW DELHI, Jan 27: After an embarrassing tussle between two benches of the Calcutta High Court over institution of a CBI investigation into alleged irregularities in issuance of caste certificates to candidates aspiring for reserved category seats, the Supreme Court today said it is taking “charge” and stayed all proceedings pending there.
A five-judge bench of the apex court chaired by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud sat on a holiday to address the dispute where a defiant Judge overruled an order of a division bench that had quashed his direction for a CBI probe and asked the Central agency to go ahead with investigation.
Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay had accused brother Judge Soumen Sen of the Division Bench of pandering to the interests of West Bengal’s ruling party to overrule his order for a CBI probe.
The Apex Court, in probably an unprecedented step, taken cognisance of the unpleasant situation on Friday, constituted a five-Judge bench, and decided to hold a special sitting today to resolve the issue that understandably caused it great discomfiture.
The Supreme Court stayed all proceedings before the Calcutta High Court and execution of the orders issued by the two benches.
“We will stay further proceedings. We are issuing notice to the State of West Bengal and the original petitioner before the HC. We will list the proceeding on Monday again. We will stay all further proceedings in the writ petition and the Letters Patent Appeal and the implementation of the single bench order referring the investigation to CBI,” the bench, also comprising justices Sanjiv Khanna, B R Gavai, Surya Kant and Aniruddha Bose, said.
The top court also allowed the West Bengal Government to file separately a Special Leave Petition (SLP) against Justice Gangopadhyay’s order for a CBI probe into the alleged irregularities.
Justice Kant joined the proceedings through video conferencing as he was out of station.
Justice Gangopadhyay had overruled the decision of a division bench of Justices Soumen Sen and Uday Kumar Ganguly which had quashed his order of registering an FIR in the case.
In the course of hearing on Saturday, Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the West Bengal Government, said the state intended to file an appeal against Justice Gangopadhyay’s order for a CBI probe.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the CBI, submitted the order of the division bench lacked jurisdiction as it stayed Justice Gangopadhyay’s order without even an appeal memo having been filed.
“I am more concerned about passing of an order without an appeal memo or any impugned order in place. This court had under Article 141 prohibited the same. I am not here defending either a single judge or division bench order,” Mehta said and sought permission for the CBI to file a note on the issue.
“We will take this up on Monday, We have taken charge now,” the bench said.
A single-judge bench of Justice Gangopadhyay had on Thursday held that the order passed by the division bench of Justices Soumen Sen and Uday Kumar Ganguly was wholly illegal and needed to be ignored. He asked the CBI to go ahead with the probe.(PTI)
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