MADHYA PRADESH FAMILY COURTS

Madhya Pradesh FAMILY COURTS Revelations on the appointments of judges in the same courts where they practised raise a stink By Ambreesh Mishra The phenomenon of "uncle judges" has hung over the portals of justice like an apparition. Now, a senior member of the bar in Madhya Pradesh has dragged the debate over nepotism in the three benches of the high court right into the public domain. Nine judges of the high court have been named in a complaint filed with Chief Justice of India S.H. Kapadia and Chief Justice of Madhya Pradesh High Court Rafat Alam. The three benches of the high court, including the principal bench in Jabalpur, have 34 judges against a sanctioned strength of 42. Two judges were sworn in only a couple of days after the president of the Gwalior High Court Advocates Bar Association Prem Singh Bhadouria made the sensational disclosure that casts a doubt over the conduct of one in four serving judges. Bhadouria, one of the 25 members of the Madhya Pradesh State Bar Council, draws heavily from the 230th report of the Law Commission which details the phenomenon of local high court judges, or the ones who are posted to the same bench before which they have practised for decades. Justice A.K. Shrivastava (Gwalior), Justice Abhay Nayak (Gwalior), Justice Sanjay Yadav (Jabalpur) and Justice Shantanu Kemkar (Indore) have been identified as having sought transfers to the respective benches where they had originally practised for years before becoming judges. Bhadouria has alleged that Justice Shrivastava, the administrative judge of the Gwalior bench, had sought the transfer to facilitate his son Sameer's practice. Justice Nayak sought a transfer to Gwalior from Jabalpur reportedly to facilitate his son Aniket's practice. Allegations against Justice Yadav and Justice Kemkar include benefits to their lawyer friends through their respective transfers from Gwalior back to Jabalpur and from Jabalpur to Indore. According to the memorandum, Justice Shubhada Waghmare continues to be posted at the Indore bench where her husband practises. Objections have also been raised to the continued postings of Justice Ram Kishore Gupta in Jabalpur where he practised as a lawyer, and his son and daughter-in-law still do. The memorandum alleges that Justice Ravi Shankar Jha, who practised in Jabalpur as a lawyer and with the office of Advocate General of Madhya Pradesh before his elevation, continues in the Jabalpur bench where his nephew Kaustubh Jha has a practice. Allegations of biases have also been levelled against Justices Ajit Singh and Aloke Aradhe at the Jabalpur bench, both who practised there for years. Bhadouria's allegations have caused a huge tumult in judicial circles. However, the Madhya Pradesh Bar Council, a statutory body under the Advocates Act 1961 that represents lawyers from across the state, has distanced itself from the move. Recently, Chief Justice Alam met 22 distinguished bar members, including the advocate general of Madhya Pradesh and the additional solicitor general of India. While the Madhya Pradesh Bar Council has distanced itself from the whole controversy, Anil Khare, president of the High Court Advocates Bar Association (Jabalpur), held a press conference and denounced Bhadouria's act as intemperate. Almost immediately, his predecessors, Adarsh Muni Trivedi and Raman Patel, contradicted Khare, saying he had let the bar down badly by questioning the whistle-blower. While the law may be blind, balancing the scales of truth and fairness needs to be weighed with open eyes when even such high offices are being compromised.