The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a plea seeking quashing of full court reference of Karnataka High Court and consequential Presidential notification appointing a junior judge as Additional Judge of Karnataka High Court.
Acting upon the plea, the division bench comprising of Justice Deepak Gupta & Justice Aniruddha Bose, who observed that the petition seeking stay on swearing in ceremony of the appointee judge cannot be entertained at the 11th Hour. The bench also said that historically the court has not interfered with a swearing ceremony, with just few minutes left for it.
The petitioner herein is an aspiring senior-most District Judge to be appointed, the Judge of High Court of Karnataka whose name was ignored and not taken into consideration for promotion/elevation along with his batch mates and that Shri P. N. Desai who is a promotee and Junior than the Petitioner, and is recommended for promotion/elevation as Judge, High Court of Karnataka during the month of July 2019.
The petitioner challenged the order of President whereby the Justice Padmaraj Nemachandra Desai has been appointed as a judge of Karnataka high Court for a period of two years. The notification was issued by the Central Government on 30th of April appointing Justice P.N. Desai and four others as additional judges of Karnataka High Court for a period of two years.
The petitioner preferred the writ petition on the ground that it is a case of super session/passing over a senior district judge by the junior district judge(s).The Petitioner has fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India and he is in the zone of consideration for promotion/elevation, fairly along with his batch mates being a senior belonging to 25.02.2008 direct district judges batch, than the appointee judge who is a promotee from the cadre of civil judges and having lesser length of service than the Petitioner.
The Supreme Court declined to interfere at the last moment and has dismissed the writ petition.
-India Legal Bureau