[REWORK needed, flow and context lacking] Against judicial propriety to ignore ratio of law in view of reference to larger bench: SC

The Supreme Court has said that judicial propriety would not allow it to ignore a ratio of law laid down in one case just because another bench in a separate case had referred the issue to a larger bench.

A bench of Justices Aniruddha Bose and Bela M Trivedi made the observation while hearing a plea related to the transfer of a case filed in CAT Hyderabad to CAT Ahmedabad.

Petitioner IPS officer Rajnish Kumar Rai challenged the rejection of his plea by the principal bench of the Central Administrative Tribunal, New Delhi.

He questioned the validity of this order before the Gujarat High Court, which again rejected his plea on the grounds of lacking territorial jurisdiction to entertain the petition.

The Gujarat HC had then relied upon the Supreme Court's judgment in the case of 'Union of India vs. Alapan Bandyopadhyay' (2022), which had stated the power of judicial review of an order transferring an original application pending before a bench of the tribunal to another bench under Section 25 of the Act can be judicially reviewed only by a division bench of the High Court within whose territorial jurisdiction the bench passing the same, falls. 

Arguing his plea, Rai's counsel referred to a decision by a coordinate bench in the case of 'Union of India vs Sanjiv Chaturvedi' (2023) in which the point of law laid down in the earlier judgment passed by this Court in the case of Alapan Bandyopadhyay has been referred to a larger bench.

"But so far as this bench is concerned, we do not think judicial propriety permits ignoring the ratio laid down by the coordinate bench in the case of Alapan Bandyopadhyay as no decision has come as yet from the larger bench on the point of territorial jurisdiction of the High Court in a similar context," the bench said.

"If we were to take a different view, the only course open for us would have been to refer the petition to the Chief Justice for being adjudicated by a larger bench, as has been done in the case of Sanjiv Chaturvedi," the bench added.

The court also pointed out no argument has been raised that the decision in the case of Alapan Bandyopadhyay is per incurium. 

However, even after examining the matter on merit, independent of Alapan Bandyopadhyay case, the court dismissed the plea. 

"We have done so with the objective that in case we found any outstanding legal merit in petitioner’s plea for transfer of the case to Ahmedabad, we could have directed so in exercise of our jurisdiction under Article 142 of the Constitution of India," the bench said.

Coming to the merit of the matter, the bench said it is not a case of the petitioner that CAT Hyderabad did not have jurisdiction as he himself had instituted the application over there.

The petitioner claimed, since at present he is residing in Ahmedabad after retirement, and if his plea is not accepted, it would cause inconvenience and undue hardship. 

The bench, however, pointed out the matter has reached final stage of hearing in the tribunal at Hyderabad. 

"That appears to be the main reason for which the principal bench of the tribunal has rejected his transfer application. We do not find any flaw in such reasoning. In such circumstances, we decline to invoke our jurisdiction under Article 136 of the Constitution of India in the present matter," the bench said.

Gujarat-cadre 1992-batch IPS officer Rai had arrested three IPS officers while investigating the Sohrabuddin Shaikh encounter case in 2007.

Case Title: RAJNISH KUMAR RAI V. UNION OF INDIA & ORS.