CJI Sanjiv Khanna urges Centre to initiate steps to oust Justice Yashwant Varma | India News

Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna

NEW DELHI: Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna is understood to have recommended to the Centre to initiate a motion in Parliament for removal of Allahabad high court‘s Justice Yashwant Varma, who refused to resign despite a judicial inquiry corroborating discovery of huge amount of cash at his official residence in Delhi on March 14.The SC officially said on Thursday that the CJI, in line with the in-house procedure, has written to President Droupadi Murmu and PM Modi “enclosing therewith copy of the three-member committee report dated May 3 along with the letter/response dated May 6 received from Justice Varma”.Under the in-house procedure, if an inquiry report indicts the judge for corruption or misdemeanour, the CJI would ask the judge concerned to either resign or seek voluntary retirement. If the judge refuses, the CJI is to write to the President and the PM to initiate removal proceedings under the Judges Inquiry Act.On the recommendation of the CJI, the govt will have to initiate a motion for removal of Justice Varma in either Lok Sabha (minimum 150 MPs to sign) or Rajya Sabha (50 MPs to sign). It would then be open for the LS speaker or the RS chairman to decide whether the motion is to be admitted.Once the motion is admitted, the speaker or chairman would constitute a three-member committee comprising an SC judge and an HC chief justice and a distinguished jurist. The committee will frame charges against the judge for investigation and the judge concerned will have an opportunity to refute the evidence.Justice Varma has been without judicial work since March 2 After a formal trial, the committee will give a report to the House concerned, which, if it finds the judge guilty, will debate the matter in the two Houses. The judge can be removed only after each House with two-thirds of members present and voting support the motion. Earlier, Parliament had debated removal motions against SC judge V Ramaswami, which fell through in Lok Sabha in 1991, and Calcutta HC’s Justice Soumitra Sen, who resigned midway through the debate in Parliament. In its May 3 report, the inquiry panel comprising Punjab and Haryana HC Chief Justice Sheel Nagu, Himachal Pradesh CJ G S Sandhawalia and Karnataka HC’s Justice Anu Sivaraman corroborated the finding that a huge amount of cash was found at Justice Varma’s residence by first responders to a fire incident at his official Tughlaq Crescent bungalow in Delhi.The inquiry panel had also detailed the mysterious disappearance of bundles of cash that had not caught fire on the night of March 14-15 after the first responders and police left the scene. The CJI had sent the adverse report to Justice Varma seeking his response.The CJI had also suggested to Justice Varma to tender his resignation given the virtual indictment by the informal inquiry panel constituted by the CJI on March 22. His refusal to do so and readiness to prove his innocence before a formal inquiry committee, which will be set up following admission of a motion in either House of Parliament, forced the CJI’s hand to write to the President and the PM.Justice Varma has been without judicial work since March 20. He was repatriated to Allahabad HC later in the month and the CJ concerned was advised not to assign him any judicial work. He will continue to be without judicial work till the formal inquiry, set up after admission of the motion for his removal in one of the Houses in Parliament, is completed and Parliament debates it.