New Delhi: The Supreme Court has said judges cannot give interviews to the media on pending matters while seeking an affidavit from the Calcutta high court on whether or not Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay had given an interview to ABP Ananda as alleged by Trinamool leader Abhishek Banerjee.
“I just want to say it that judges have no business granting interviews on matters which are pending,” Chief Justice D.Y. Chandachud, according to Bar and Bench.
In response to the petitioner that Justice Gangopadhyay had given an interview to the television channel in September last year and had shown his “dislike” for him, the CJI said a new judge must take up the case if he had indeed given the interview. He directed the registrar of the Calcutta high court to file the affidavit before it by Thursday, April 28. The matter will be heard on Friday, April 29.
Also read: Why a HC Judge’s Interview to a TV Channel Is Being Seen as a Crusade Against Corruption
” If he [Justice Gangopadhyay] said that about the petitioner, he has no business participating in the proceedings. The question is whether a judge who has made statements like these about a political personality should he be allowed to participate in the hearings. There has to be some process,” the CJI said while clarifying that he is not getting into the merits of the case.
The matter came up before the apex court in response to Banerjee’s petition challenging the high court order against him, which had ordered an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the alleged Bengal school jobs scam. The apex court had already stayed the high court against Banerjee earlier.
Banerjee claimed that the accused in the alleged scam were pressurised into naming him, which led to a high court ordering the probe against him. He had said that he was neither a party nor connected to the writ petition being heard in the alleged scam. Banerjee had said that Justice Gangopadhyay who passed the order “disliked” him referring to the purported interview last September.
The TMC leader also claimed that Justice Gangopadhyay had made critical remarks against Supreme Court judges who were hearing his appeals in the case in open court.”Supreme Court judges can do whatever they want? Is this a Zamindari?” Banerjee alleged Justice Gangopadhyay as saying.
To this, the top court said, “The fact that judicial orders passed by the highest court of the land are not only under scrutiny but criticism in the most cavalier manner by the said Ld. Single Judge calls for intervention by this Hon’ble Court so as to ensure that the majesty of the institution is maintained and the faith which a common man deposes in it stands strong.”
As The Wire reported earlier, the interview, aired on September 17, 2022, made him the talk of the town, as it was rare for a judge to speak to a news channel at such length. In the interview, Justice Gangopadhyay had said that he is in favour of “strictest action” against anyone “who points a finger at the judiciary, otherwise, people will lose faith in the justice system”.
Referring to Banerjee indirectly, he had said, “He (Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee) once commented on the judiciary. I was not in Kolkata then. I was in Ladakh. Sitting there, I thought I will issue a ruling against him, I will summon him, I will take action. Once back in Kolkata, I found that a petition was filed in this regard, but a division bench did not consider it. They thought he would get extra attention. But I have a different opinion.”
Justice Gangopadhyay, who is being referred to as “people’s judge” by those affected by the alleged jobs scam, had said that he never tolerated corruption. “I want to pass a few judgments which, long after I will not be there, will come up before researchers who will know that there was a judge like this,” he had said.
On the same day, a public interest litigation (PIL) was filed before a Calcutta high court division bench, headed by Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava, seeking to stop the telecast of Justice Gangopadhyay’s interview later in the evening. The bench, however, dismissed the plea.
Justice Gangopadhyay was appointed as the additional judge of the Calcutta high court on May 2, 2018, and started functioning as a permanent judge of the high court on July 30, 2020. This is not the first time that Justice Gangopadhyay has been the centre of debate in political circles of the state.