CHENNAI: Taking serious objection to the recent trend of the judges of the Madras High Court traversing widely beyond the scope of the cases before them and making unwanted observations, a group of advocates have sent a memorandum to the Chief Justice and pleaded her to advise the judges to desist themselves from making such remarks.
The memorandum, signed by senior advocate R Vaigai and advocates Anna Mathew and Sudha Ramalingam and 61 others, was presented to the CJ on August 20.
The memorandum, in particular, took objection to the remarks made by Justice S Vaidyanathan in his judgment dated August 13 relating to Madras Christian College. The order revealed his conduct, which was `unbecoming of a judge', it said and added that his action went against the duty of the judges to uphold the Constitution and the laws. The observations amounted to the transgression of judicial discipline because once a case is decided, the judge is ceased to have jurisdiction to express his opinion on issues that did not arise in the case.
The memo also pointed out a judgment of Justice Vaidyanathan delivered in November 2015 prescribing dress code for the devotees in temples while passing orders on a writ petition seeking permission to hold a cultural programme in connection with a temple festival. This order, however, was reversed by a division bench later. The bench also had expressed its anguish over the conduct of the judge in intruding into areas that were beyond the ambit of the case.
It also stated that there are other judges who made comments that are unrelated to the case before them. Some of these comments include those made by Justice N Kirubakaran about the castration of offenders of child sexual abuse and economic independence is a reason for an increase in extra-marital relationships. A division bench in February this year had disapproved Justice Kirubakaran for converting a writ petition pertaining to law faculty into public interest litigation (PIL) and going beyond the scope of the subject matter.
The memo further stated that the danger of using the judicial pulpit for pronouncing such unconstitutional personal views is that they become a judicial order, carrying extraordinary weight and authority. It compels the laymen, the legislators, the executives, and investigative agencies to treat it with the utmost respect and implement the directions, even if the same were passed without the authority of law.
If every judge was permitted to pass orders indiscriminately on issues that are not the subject matter of the litigation or against those who are not even parties to the case, judicial anarchy will prevail and the very edifice that the judicial institution stands on will crumble. In this connection, the memo referred to the February 2018 orders of the Supreme Court which stated that if judicial discipline and propriety are not maintained, the judicial institution `will go forever'.
The memo urged the Chief Justice not to post before Justice Vaidyanathan matters relating to religion and women. Vaigai and others appeared before the judge on Wednesday and requested him to withdraw the August 13 judgment in toto or delete all the three paragraphs which allegedly undermined the Christian institutions and its missionaries. The judge replied that he will consider the issue on Thursday.