‘Will one party tell SC which cases should be heard’, former CJI furious at Sanjay Raut’s allegation

Former Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud has clarified the recent allegations by Shiv Sena blaming him for the defeat of the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in the recent Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut had alleged that Justice Chandrachud had eliminated the fear of law from the state politicians by not deciding on the petitions on disqualification of MLAs, leaving the doors open for political defection and subsequently leading to the defeat of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in the elections.

Sanjay Raut had accused CJI

Raut said this in a press conference after the announcement of results and said that history will not forgive him.

In the assembly elections held on November 20, Shiv Sena (UBT) managed to win only 20 out of the 94 seats contested as part of the MVA alliance. Its other allies in the MVA also fared poorly, with the Congress winning only 16 of the 101 seats and the NCP (Sharad Pawar) only 10 of the 86 seats.

CJI lashes out at Sanjay Raut’s statement

In an interview with ANI, Justice Chandrachud, responding to criticism from the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, said, Well, my answer is very simple… Throughout this year, we were dealing with fundamental constitutional matters, nine-judge bench judgments, seven-judge bench judgments, five-judge bench judgments. Now, should any one party or individual decide which case should be heard by the Supreme Court? Sorry, that choice lies with the Chief Justice.

In the year 2022, there was a split in the undivided Shiv Sena following Eknath Shinde’s rebellion, which led to the fall of the then ruling MVA government led by Uddhav Thackeray and the formation of the Mahayuti government led by Eknath Shinde. Thackeray then filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking disqualification of MLAs who broke away from the party along with Eknath Shinde. The Shinde faction also filed a counter petition.

The Supreme Court asked Assembly Speaker Rahul Narvekar to decide on the disqualification petitions of rival factions. In January this year, the Speaker declared the Shinde faction as the “real” Shiv Sena. In an interview with ANI, Justice Chandrachud highlighted that cases have been pending in the Supreme Court for 20 years.

We have limited manpower: CJI

The former Chief Justice said, “You have told us that we are not working even for a minute of the time given to us and such criticism is justified. Important constitutional cases have been pending in the Supreme Court for 20 years. Why is the Supreme Court not taking up these 20-year-old cases and why not considering some recent cases? And then if you take up old cases, you are told that you did not take up this particular case.” You have limited manpower and you have a certain number of judges, you have to strike a balance.

Asked about Shiv Sena UBT’s allegation about “delay” in the verdict in the Shiv Sena case, the CJI said, “See, that is the problem. The real problem is that a certain section of politics feels that if you follow my agenda then you are independent… You know, you follow my agenda, which includes all the matters which I think you should decide.” Justice Chandrachud said, “We decided on electoral bonds. Was it any less important?”

We have given verdict on many important issues – CJI
The former Chief Justice said, “We recently gave the verdict in the Aligarh Muslim University case, which involves the closure of madrassas under the Allahabad High Court order. We have considered issues related to disability rights of individuals. Is disability in any way less important than these matters which we are referring to.

We have decided on important issues related to the federal structure. This year, and these are all cases that we have decided this year, we decided on the constitutional validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, which granted citizenship to certain persons who had migrated from Bangladesh before March 25, 1971. Was it any less important?

“We considered a case pending before a Constitution Bench on whether it concerns lakhs of people not from the highest strata of society but from the lowest strata of society. The question was whether a person who has a licence to drive a light motor vehicle can drive a transport vehicle weighing less than 7,500 kg. Now this would have affected the livelihood of lakhs of people. We ruled on this just before our term ended. Are these cases that we have ruled on, in fact, we have ruled on 38 Constitution Bench references during our term, including this year, are these cases any less important than any particular case?

Now, the cases that we have ruled on this year, any of these cases that I have mentioned earlier, are these cases any less important? Or else we follow an agenda set by others that, okay, you have to decide this case for me today. If you don’t decide my case, then, well, you are not independent. This is something which is unacceptable,” the former CJI said.

He said, this is the real problem today and that is why, you know, I must say this. This is because I have refused to do this during my tenure as Chief Justice. We have refused to be guided by any third party as to which case to decide. Sometimes, you know, persons with a lot of resources come to the court and they try to influence the system by saying, well, my case should be heard first.