In a turn of anguish and displeasure during the hearing in the Madhya Pradesh women judges termination case, the Supreme Court on Tuesday slammed the state High Court for terminating the services of women civil judges in the State and refused to reinstate some of them.
"I wish men had menstruation, then only, they would understand," a two-judge Bench of the apex court, led by Justice B V Nagarathna and Justice N Kotiswar Singh said, while indirectly referring to the lackadaisical attitude of the MP HC in terminating the services of women civil judges in the State and refused to reinstate some of them.
"Particularly for women, if they are suffering physically and mentally, don't say they are slow and send them home. Let there be same criteria for male judges and judicial officers, we will see then, and we know what happens. How can you have target units (of case disposal) for district judiciary?" Justice Nagarathna remarked and fixed the matter for further hearing on December 12 in the case.
While taking suo motu cognisance on January this year, the issue of the termination of the six judges by the Madhya Pradesh government in June 2023, the apex court was hearing the matter under title -- In Re: Termination of Civil Judge, Class-II (JR. Division) Madhya Pradesh State Judicial Service.
During the hearing today, an angry court observed that the case disposal rate cannot be a yardstick when the judges were suffering mentally and physically.
"It is very easy to say 'dismissed-dismissed' and go home. Even we are hearing this matter at length; can lawyers say we are slow?," the apex court remarked.
Earlier on July 23, 2024, the same bench of the apex court, had asked the Madhya Pradesh High Court to reconsider its decision of terminating the services of judicial officers, within a month, to consider the representations of the affected judge afresh.
The State Law Department of the Madhya Pradesh government had passed the order to sack these six women judges after an administrative committee and a full court meeting found their performance during the probation period as unsatisfactory.
"We request the full court of the Madhya Pradesh High Court to reconsider the cases of these judicial officers. On reconsideration, a copy of resolution be placed before this court preferably within four weeks," the apex court had earlier ordered.
The six women judges whose services have been terminated by the Madhya Pradesh govt are Sarita Chaudhary, Priya Sharma, Rachna Atulkar Joshi, Aditi Kumar Sharma, Sonakshi Joshi and Jyoti Barkhade.
