Report No. 195
Brief Chronology of facts and Judgments in Justice V.Ramaswami's cases:
Before we proceed to refer to the principles laid down in the above judgments, we propose to set out the background of facts which led to the above judgments.
Justice V. Ramaswami was appointed Chief Justice of the High Court of Punjab and Haryama and there were certain allegations of financial impropriety and other irregularities against him while he was working as Chief Justice of that High Court at Chandigarh. By the time of the inquiry, he had been elevated to the Supreme Court. The then Chief Justice of India, Justice Sabyasachi Mukharji, took note of the allegations and advised Justice Ramaswami, to abstain from judicial functions until the allegations were cleared. On 18th July, 1990, upon receipt of the letter, Justice V. Ramaswami applied for leave for six weeks in the first instance w.e.f. 23rd July, 1990. The Chief Justice directed the office to process his application for leave. These facts are contained in statement of the Chief Justice of India to the Bar dated 20th July, 1990.
The Chief Justice of India then appointed a Committee consisting of three Judges of the Supreme Court (B.C. Ray, K.J. Shetty and M.N.Venkatachaliah JJ), presided over by Justice B.C. Ray, to go into the facts to find out whether there was any prima facie truth in the allegations requiring the judge not to exercise judicial functions. The said Committee was not a Committee of Inquiry into the charges, but was constituted only to ascertain the facts in a prima facie manner.
After some inquiries, it expressed the view that charges of improper conduct involving moral turpitude were not established. It then considered whether, before a regular inquiry is instituted, Justice V. Ramaswami could be asked to desist functioning as a judge. It was of the view that as long as the constitutional warrant appointing him as Judge of the Supreme Court was in force, he could not be asked not to exercise his judicial functions. It stated:
"In the result, till the matters are finally examined at the appropriate levels, it is difficult to hold that the Judge should consider himself disentitled to discharge the judicial functions of his office. However, (only if ) upon a careful analysis of all the material, the appropriate authorities find facts from which an inference of moral turpitude becomes inescapable and if the Chief Justice of India agrees that those assessments are bona fide and the facts proved reasonably justify or admit of such inferences, then and then alone, could it be said that it will be an embarrassment for the Judge to discharge judicial functions. Till then, it is perhaps inappropriate to say anythin.- apart from what we have indicated by way of financial reimbursement.- which may have the effect of interdicting the legal incidence of constitutional warrant of the appointment of the Judge."
Thus, the B.C. Ray Committee thought that, at the stage when the allegations were not yet inquired into, there was no justification to interdict the Judge's right to function as per the warrant of appointment.
Thereafter, on 28th February, 1991, 108 Members of the Lok Sabha presented a Motion to the Speaker of the 9th Lok Sabha for Address to the President for the removal of the learned Judge under Article 124(4) of the Constitution read with the provisions of Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968. On March 12, 1991, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha in purported exercise of his general powers as well as of his powers under Section 3 of the said Act, admitted the Motion and constituted a three member committee consisting of Justice P.B. Sawant, Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice P.D. Desai, Chief Justice of Bombay High Court and Justice O. Chinnappa Reddi, a Jurist who was also former Judge of the Supreme Court, to investigate into the grounds on which the removal was prayed for. This Committee was thus one under section 3 of the 1968 Act.
Soon after the decision of the Speaker to admit the Motion and constitute the Committee as aforesaid, the term of the 9th Lok Sabha came to a premature end upon its dissolution. The Supreme Court by its judgment dated October 29, 1991 declared that the Motion as well as the decision of the Speaker have not lapsed and that the Committee can conduct the inquiry. (Sub Committee of Judicial Accountability v. Union of India, 1991(4) SCC 699. We shall refer to the various constitutional issues decided in the judgment separately.
After the said judgment, the Committee started the inquiry and framed 14 charges on the basis of the allegations. Justice V. Ramaswami did not participate in the inquiry in spite of notice. The Committee took evidence and prepared an elaborate report in regard to 14 charges, on July 20, 1992. They held Charge numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13 and 14 have been proved, that Charge No. 5 was not proved (subject to the finding on Charge No. 7), Charge Nos. 6 and 10 were also not proved. It held that Charge No. 12 was partly proved.
At that stage, Justice Ramaswami's wife Mrs. Sarojini Ramaswami filed writ petition 514 of 1992 requesting for a direction that the Committee hand over a copy of the Report to Justice Ramaswami before it was submitted to the Speaker of the Lok Sabha in order to enable Justice V. Ramaswami to question the findings of the Committee in judicial review proceedings in a court of law. By another elaborate judgment the Supreme Court dismissed the writ petition on 27th October, 1992 (vide Sarojini Ramaswami v. Union of India, 1992(4) SCC 506. Several important constitutional principles were again laid down by the Supreme Court in this judgment to which we shall be referring in detail.
Thereafter, one Mr. Krishnaswamy who was a Member of Parliament filed a writ petition ( WP. 149 of 1992) seeking a review of the earlier judgment of the Supreme Court in Sub Committee on Judicial Accountability v. Union of India, 1991(4) SCC 699. Another person Mr. Raj Kanwar filed a writ petition 140 of 1992 contending that the notice of Motion and its admission by the Speaker were unconstitutional. Both these writ petitions were dismissed by the Supreme Court by its third judgment in Krishnaswamy v. Union of India, 1992(4) SCC 605 on 27th October, 1992.
After the Report of the Committee was tabled in Parliament, Justice V. Ramaswami was given a copy of the Report and he, in fact, filed a written memorandum before the Parliament. In Parliament, he was represented by Mr. Kapil Sibal, Senior Advocate. Several Members having abstained, the Motion for removal did not ultimately succeed.
Thereafe3ed the findings of the Committee. This Writ Petition was dismissed.
These four judgments laid down several important principles regarding interpretation of Article 121,124,125 of the Constitution and of the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968 which are quite relevant for an analysis of the provisions of the present Judges (Inquiry) Bill, 2005. These principles will be referred to in detail in this Chapter.
Before we deal with the above judgments, we shall refer to the points arising out of the Report of Justice P.B. Sawant Committee, which was appointed by the Speaker.
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