Conflicting orders:Acting CJ of J'khand HC files report in SC

The Supreme Court today took on record the enquiry report of acting Chief Justice of Jharkhand High Court D N Patel on the issue of conflicting orders passed by a judge there in granting bail to former state minister Yogendra Sao.
The former minister was granted bail by the high court in a case of violence related to alleged land acquisition.
A bench of Justices S A Bobde and L Nageswara Rao perused the enquiry report of acting chief justice and asked the parties to go through the comments made by him.
After the counsel for petitioner and Sao's wife Nirmala Devi and the state government perused the comments, the bench directed that the report of the acting chief justice be kept in a sealed cover.

The bench said it will take up the matter for further hearing tomorrow.
On November 8, the apex court had asked the acting chief justice to conduct an inquiry into the issue terming it as a "serious matter" which could "bring the administration of justice into disrepute".

It had said the enquiry should be done as under what circumstances were contradictory orders passed and how they got uploaded in the high court website and later removed.
The apex court's direction had come on a plea of Nirmala Devi, a Congress MLA from Barkagaon in Jharkhand, against rejection of her bail by the high court in a case related to violence in the constituency.

The bench had noted that orders passed by the high court in the two bail applications of Nirmala Devi and Yogendera Sao were in two parts each.
It said in the case of Nirmala Devi, the parts of the order had similar reasons and concluded that her bail plea be rejected.
While in the case of her husband Yogendra Sao, the first part contained reasons to deny him bail and was signed by the judge who gave the order, it said.
However, in the second part of the same order, the judge had given reasons for grant of bail, the top court said.

It was pointed out to the bench that the second part of both orders were initially uploaded on the website of the high court but subsequently removed from there.
Both Nirmala Devi and Sao were accused in the case relating to violent clashes between villagers and the police in 2016 in which four persons were killed.
Nirmala Devi had led the agitation against National Thermal Power Corporation authorities for their alleged attempt to forcefully evacuate villagers from Barkagaon without giving them due compensation or rehabilitation.