It seems Khanna has been turning everything topsy-turvy to favor Kejariwal. Abhishek Manu Singhavi has gone into an appeal against the 9th April 2024 judgment of Delhi High Court’s Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma ( W.P.(CRL) 985/2024 & CRL.M.A. 9427/2024). There cannot be any other basis for appeal and argument.
Khanna and Singhavi have to prove that Justice Sharma’s verdict was flawed. That’s what the Supreme Court is supposed to do. It’s not supposed to retry a case that has already been tried in a lower court and verdict delivered. He should examine the evidences presented in Justice Sharma’s verdict and comment and adjudicate on that.
However, he seems to have decided to try the entire case even before all evidences are collected, investigations are completed, and the case is duly prosecuted in a trial court. He is in such a hurry that he now wants SC to become the trial court, giving a go by to the appellate process.
Why is he doing it? He knows he will not be able to find fault with Justice Sharma’s watertight verdict and set it aside. So, he chooses to ignore it by indulging in a convoluted line of questioning to confuse the issue and then conjure a rabbit out of an empty hat and deliver a verdict of his choice the way he did earlier by granting ‘interim bail’ to Kejari. If it is highly unseemly that SC entertains petitions for bail, it’s downright mockery of justice to ignore the letter and spirit of an HC verdict that has been appealed against.
Khanna is apparently compromised. He bamboozles and browbeats ED lawyers by ignoring the points made in the comprehensive 106-page judgment of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma. It’s a perfect judgement. If Khanna ignores it, he will be dishonouring the long established norms and tenets of justice like fairness and equality of all before the law and ‘justice must not only be done, but it must also be seen to be done.’
Here is the Judgement by Justice Sharma. You should go through it.
Justice Sharma has left no room for doubt and has even pinned down the ‘juvenile arguments’ of Abhishek Manu Singhavi with facts and solid points of law. The verdict exposes Singhavi as a bad lawyer, which can be amply proven by his previous record. His success in the profession is entirely correlated to his Lutyen’s Zone citizenry and personal connections in the fraternity of judges and politicians. He is into ‘tactical lawyering’, which literally means waylaying justice instead of seeking it. It can also be termed as ‘court fixing’.
Justice Sharma was obviously aware that crooked Kejariwal, Singhavi and the left-liberal eco-system would tear her to pieces if her judgement did not suit their devious political ends. Thus she decided to take 4 days to write it to nail all stratagems and insipid arguments of Kejariwal’s lawyers even if they didn’t deserve such attention and mention. She quotes copiously from past judgments of various courts to buttress her final conclusion with detailed, clearheaded and pointed analysis.
I have read some of the judgments of Chandrachud that come across as childish compared with this one. Here is my analysis of one of his judgments. https://khullamkhulla.wordpress.com/2023/05/14/chandrachud-writes-an-insane-judgment-unfairly-targets-the-office-of-governor-wastes-precious-resources-and-time-of-sc/
Now let me quote the Para 174 of Justice Sharma’s judgement to illustrate my point.
174. In the case at hand, it is important to clarify that the matter before this Court is not a conflict between the Central Government and the petitioner Sh. Arvind Kejriwal. Instead, it is a case between the petitioner Sh. Arvind Kejriwal and the Directorate of Enforcement. In such legal proceedings, it is crucial for the Court to maintain its focus solely on the legal merits of the case. Political factors or dynamics should not and have never influenced the court’s deliberations or decision-making process. The role of the Court is to impartially assess the evidence presented and apply the relevant laws to determine the outcome of the case. Any attempt to introduce political considerations into the proceedings would undermine the integrity of the legal process and could compromise the pursuit of justice. Therefore, it is essential for the court to remain vigilant in ensuring that the case is adjudicated based on legal principles and not influenced by extraneous factors.
She was forced to write this because Singhavi’s arguments had little to do with law and evidences. They were political innuendos. No good lawyer true to his salt and profession would have raised those points. But crooked Singhavi did it and Justice Sharma had to nail it with decisive finality, which she did.
Now look at how Khanna readily entertained Singhavi’s innuendos, totally ignoring the points made in Justice Sharma’s judgment. He was not supposed to do that. Singhavi had gone in an appeal against Justice Sharma’s verdict. The arguments should have been based on it. In my knowledge, Special Leave Petitions (SLPs) are not supposed to have a fresh look at cases. They are meant to examine the verdicts of High Courts based on whatever evidence has already been on record.
Khanna’s order granting interim bail to Kejariwal didn’t refer to the above said Para 174 of Justice Sharma’s verdict. It ignored the verdict altogether, disregarding established norms. It was not just arbitrary but a politically motivated order and thus a travesty of justice. Khanna was brazen about it. The absolute power of a SC judge has seemingly gone to his head.
Whatever is happening in his court NOW is bizarre. Instead of adjudicating over Justice Sharma’s verdict, he is inventing and innovating fresh arguments at the promptings of Singhavi who continues to play his dirty tricks. His strategy is clear. He does not want Justice Sharma’s verdict to come into play. Justice is not the goal here. The goal is to somehow deliver a prejudicial and preordained designer verdict of the kind that has become a norm with the present SC led by judges like Chandrchud, Gavai, and Khanna.
Never before have we seen such plethora of exceptional judgments as now in the long history of SC. One bad precedent after another is being set and we are watching it helplessly. Then we learn that Kapil Sibbal has become the President of the SC Bar Association. A lawyer who deserves to be disbarred will be heading the Bar now. क्या कलियुग का अंत निकट है?
Let me clarify here that I’m not a student of law. The only connection with law I have is because of my late father who was a lawyer in the district court of Ballia. He had done his LLB from Allahabad University way back in 1925. Even as a kid I would often visit the Kachahari and listen to lawyers arguing cases. In those days judges and lawyers came across to me as warm-hearted elders and good people, all dignified men of honour and integrity who taught their kids to be just, truthful and honest.
When I look at judges and lawyers like Chandrchud, Khanna, Kapil Sibbal, and Singhavi I’m filled with extreme disdain and disgust. They are not honourable people. I don’t know what their kids and grandkids would be learning from them except deviousness, skulduggery and crookedness.
They come across to me as a bunch of sleazy men and women having an orgy like in the Tom Cruise film EYES WIDE SHUT. I also conjure the images of hovering dogs in Kafka’s story titled INVESTIGATIONS OF A DOG that was adopted by me as a Hindi play titled Ek Kutte Ki Jaanch Padtal. I had not known of the Lutyen’s Zone legend then. Had I known it, I would have written an original THE HOVERING DOGS OF THE LUTYEN’S ZONE. It’s a good subject for a documentary.
Rajesh Kumar Singh
khullamkhulla.wordpress.com 