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Synopsis

The Supreme Court of India on Wednesday, September 25, strongly condemned the controversial remarks made by a Karnataka High Court judge, who referred to a particular locality in Bengaluru as 'Pakistan.'

The five-judge bench, comprising Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and Justices Sanjiv Khanna, BR Gavai, Surya Kant, and Hrishikesh Roy, while emphasizing that judges must ensure their personal biases do not influence their duties, said, "We can't call any part of the territory of India Pakistan because that fundamentally is contrary to the territorial integrity of the nation."

The top court's intervention came after the video of Justice Srihasnanda went viral, where he referred to a Muslim-majority area of Bengaluru as “Pakistan” during a hearing in a landlord-tenant case. In another incident, he pulled up a lady advocate on answering a question out of turn and said that, as she knew a lot about the opposite party, she could even reveal the colour of his undergarment.

In light of these incident, the bench asserted that casual and misogynistic comments must be avoided and said, "The perception of justice to every segment of society is as important as the rendition of justice as an objective fact. Since the judge of the Karnataka High Court is not a party to the proceedings, we desist from making any further observations, saving except to express our serious concern about both the reference to gender and a segment of the community. Such observations are liable to be construed in a negative light, thereby impacting not only the court of the judge who expressed that but also the wider judicial system.

The bench further accepted the apology rendered by the Karnataka HC judge in the open court and closed the suo motu proceeding.

It highlighted that the heart and soul of judging lies in being impartial and fair, and the only values that must guide judicial decision-making are the ones enshrined in the Constitution.

Additionally, the bench noted that with the emergence of social media and court proceedings being widely shared online, judges must elicit appropriate behaviour from both the bench and the bar.

While discussing the impact of online sharing, Solicitor General of India (SG) Tushar Mehta submitted that "social media cannot be controlled, and the anonymity it offers makes it a very dangerous tool."

In response, (CJI) DY Chandrachud said, "The answer to sunlight is more sunlight," and emphasized that the solution is not to close doors and shut everything down.

Notably, on September 20, the Supreme Court took suo moto cognisance of the remarks made by Justice Srihasnanda.

"Our attention has been drawn to some comment made by Karnataka High Court judge Justice V Srishananda during the conduct of judicial proceedings. We ask the registrar general of the High Court to submit a report to this court after seeking administrative directions from the Chief Justice of Karnataka High Court," the order had read.

Case Title: IN RE: Remarks by High Court Judge during Court Proceedings