BCI meeting on SC judges issue, says presser 'unfortunate'

Bar Council of India (BCI) Chairman Manan Kumar Mishra said a meeting of the members is being held on Saturday evening, after which a delegation will meet Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra and the four senior judges, who spoke against the CJI on Friday.

Kumar said: "We have a meeting at today (Saturday) and tomorrow (Sunday). Our delegation will meet Chief Justice Dipak Misra and those four senior judges to request them to resolve the issue internally."

He said it was "most unfortunate" that four senior judges held a press conference, sending out a message that all was not well with the Supreme Court and that the issue should have been "sorted out internally", the BCI Chairman said.

On Friday, in an unprecedented move, the four senior-most judges in the Supreme Court burst out in the open and accused the Chief Justice of not adhering to the rules in assigning cases to appropriate benches, which they said could create "doubts" about the integrity of the top court.

Speaking to the media at the residence of Justice Chelameswar, the judges said the Supreme Court administration was "not in order" and released an undated letter they had written to Justice Misra in which they conceded that the CJI was the "master of the roster" but this was "not a recognition of any superior authority, legal or factual, of the Chief Justice over his colleagues".

The four judges are justices Ranjan Gogoi, Kurian Joseph and Madan B. Lokur, besides Justice Chelameswar.

--IANS

gt/nir