CHENNAI: Justice G Jayachandran of the Madras High Court has stated that Justice GR Swaminathan showed a ‘semblance of personal bias’ against the Tamil Nadu police in quashing their order to detain jailed YouTuber Savukku Shankar under the Goondas Act without giving a fair opportunity to the police to present their case and without consulting the co-judge in the bench.
“Failure to afford opportunity to file the counter, when it was sought, and the bias of showing interest in passing order hastily without consulting the bench partner renders the expression of opinion by Justice GR Swaminathan non est,” the judge noted in the order.
The observations were part of the order recently passed by Justice G Jayachandran, the third judge, to whom the habeas corpus petition filed by the YouTuber’s mother, A Kamala, was referred to after the vacation bench of Justices GR Swaminathan and PB Balaji delivered a split verdict. The judge, in his order, referred the matter to the regular division bench hearing HCPs as he found the split verdict to be ‘incomplete’.
In the split verdict, Justice Swaminathan had quashed the detention order passed by the Greater Chennai Police Commissioner while Justice Balaji had held that police must be given time to file their counter-affidavit as sought by the Advocate General.
Justice Swaminathan had stated that he decided to take up the case without giving time for filing the counter-affidavit because two persons had met him as ‘emissaries’ and tried to dissuade him from hearing the petition.
“The reasons which has triggered him (Justice Swaminathan) to deny the opportunity to the state is more disturbing and makes his finding on facts liable to be eschewed not only for want of completion by the opinion of junior judge in the bench but also for the semblance of personal bias against the respondent against whom a serious allegation of approaching through emissary is made,” Justice Jayachandran said.
He said that it was not a judgment with split verdict but a ‘unilateral opinion’ of one judge sans the opinion of the companion judge in the bench and it suffers ‘incompleteness’. He further said the basic principle of none be judged without giving a fair opportunity to be heard was not followed.
“The Latin maxim ‘Audi Alteram Partem’ (no person should be judged without a fair hearing) is the very first lesson taught in law schools in all democratic countries. Issuance of rule nisi (show cause notice) in a HCP is to afford opportunity to the respondent to show cause how the impugned order of detention is sustainable,” he noted. The expression of opinion made by Justice Swaminathan suffered ‘partial application of mind’ and his opinion ‘lost the character of judgment’ since it was penned without affording opportunity for explanation, Justice Jayachandran said.