NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA), the body of lawyers practicing in the Supreme Court, on Saturday passed a resolution demanding that all Public Interest Litigation petitions should be heard by the Chief Justice of India or the Collegium judges in what is seen as endorsement of the four seniormost judges (who constitute the collegium under the CJI) protesting at cases of national importance being assigned to juniors.
The resolution says the CJI should take up the PIL matters, including pending PIL petitions, or assign them to the judges in the collegium. Henceforth, a norm should be put in place to ensure that all PIL petitions are heard by first five courts, the resolution said.
If this resolution is accepted by the Supreme Court, the PIL on mysterious death of Mumbai CBI Judge Loya pending before Court No 10 of Justice Arun Mishra will have to be heard by one of the judges of the collegium. The Loya case has been listed before the Bench headed by Justice Mishra on Tuesday since another judge on the Bench is not available on Monday.
As regards the crisis created by an unprecedented press conference by the four judges, the SCBA passed a resolution calling for a full court meeting of the Supreme Court to resolve the issues. Another lawyers’ association, the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA), also came out with a statement on Saturday, urging the stakeholders (judges) to resolve their issues internally.
