Justice Yashwant Varma Faces Major Setback as Supreme Court Rules on Parliamentary Panel

Justice Yashwant Varma Faces Major Setback as Supreme Court Rules on Parliamentary Panel

In a huge setback for Allahabad High Court judge Yashwant Varma, the Supreme Court has dismissed his petition challenging the Lok Sabha Speaker’s decision to admit a motion seeking his removal and the legality of the parliamentary panel probing corruption charges against him.

A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and SC Sharma, which had reserved its decision on January 8 on Varma’s plea, pronounced the verdict.

On December 16, the Supreme Court decided to examine the petition filed by Justice Varma assailing the action of the Lok Sabha Speaker to “unilaterally” constitute a committee under the Judges (Inquiry) Act to investigate him. Justice Varma, represented by senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, had said the constitution of the committee under Section 3(2) of the 1968 Act violated both his right to be treated and protected equally by the law. He argued that though notices of motion for removal were given in both Houses of Parliament on the same day, the Speaker constituted the committee unilaterally.

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‘XXX’ vs Union of India

A huge controversy broke out on March 15 last year after firefighters called to Justice Varma’s bungalow in Delhi discovered piles of money that had been burnt by a fire. This raised questions about corruption in the highest levels of the judicial system in the country.

While Justice Varma denied any link to the cash and called the allegations against him “preposterous”, the top court set up an in-house panel that recommended his impeachment. The panel’s report was forwarded to President Droupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi – by then Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna – with the same recommendation. Following this, Justice Varma wrote a petition challenging the top court panel’s recommendation to remove him.

He, however, had kept his identity a secret in the petition – and was then referred to as ‘XXX’ in court documents. 

In his writ petition, Justice Varma had offered the two-judge bench of Justice Dipankar Datta and AG Masih five reasons why he could not be sacked, including questions over the jurisdiction and authority of the in-house committee to investigate a sitting judge. However, the Supreme Court had knocked back his challenge, ruling that the Judge’s petition was “not worth entertaining” and reproached him for his “not confidence-inspiring conduct”.