Cash row: Justice Varma petitions SC challenging in-house probe report

New Delhi: Justice Yashwant Varma, a sitting judge of the Allahabad High Court, has petitioned the Supreme Court challenging his indictment by the three-member in-house committee in the cash-discovery row.

The writ petition filed before the top court also sought to quash the communication forwarded by then CJI Sanjiv Khanna to the President and then Prime Minister to take action against Justice Varma.

As per the petition, the in-house panel acted in a “pre-determined manner” and denied Justice Varma a fair opportunity to defend himself.

The petition has been filed before the Supreme Court at a time when the Union government is reportedly preparing to initiate removal proceedings against Justice Varma, with an impeachment motion expected to be tabled in the upcoming session of Parliament.

The then Delhi High Court judge Justice Varma is embroiled in a controversy surrounding the alleged discovery of a huge pile of burnt cash in the storeroom attached to his bungalow in New Delhi after the fire brigade had gone there to douse a blaze on March 14.

Following the cash-discovery episode, which sent shockwaves across the judicial corridors, Justice Varma was repatriated to the Allahabad High Court, and an in-house probe was set up to probe the allegations.

According to the probe committee, both direct and electronic evidence confirmed that the storeroom was under the covert or active control of Justice Varma and his family.

By way of strong inferential evidence, the in-house panel said the burnt cash was removed from the storeroom during the early hours of March 15. In conclusion, the three-member inquiry committee, comprising Chief Justice Sheel Nagu of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, CJ G.S. Sandhawalia of the Himachal Pradesh HC and Karnataka HC’s Justice Anu Sivaraman, found the allegations serious enough to merit impeachment proceedings against Justice Varma.

It opined that Justice Varma’s misconduct was not only proven but also grave enough to warrant his removal under Article 124(4) of the Constitution.

Meanwhile, advocate Mathews J. Nedumpara, along with other co-petitioners, for a third time in the row, filed a writ petition before the Supreme Court seeking a direction to the Delhi Police to register an FIR, saying that the Union government, which is in charge of the Delhi Police, was duty-bound to direct registration of an FIR in relation to the incident of alleged recovery of huge amounts of unaccounted cash from Justice Varma’s residence.

IANS