A-G Venugopal declines consent for contempt proceedings against Kapil Sibal

The statements which pertain to loss of faith in the Supreme Court are not contemptuous on the face of it, Venugopal said

Attorney General K K Venugopal has declined consent to initiate contempt proceedings against senior advocate Kapil Sibal for making statements allegedly scandalising the Supreme Court.

In his speech in People's Tribunal on 'Judicial Rollback of Civil Liberties', last month, Sibal had said, "A court where judges are selected through a process of compromise, a court where there is no system to determine which case will be presided by which bench, where the CJI decided which matter will be dealt with by which bench, that court can never be independent."

He also claimed, "After 50 years (of practice) in the Supreme Court, I find that I have no expectation from this institution."

Read | No hope left in Supreme Court: Kapil Sibal

A Delhi advocate, Vineet Jindal sought consent of the A-G under Section 15 of the Contempt of Courts Act to initiate contempt proceedings against Sibal, claiming his statements have been made with intent to disgrace and scandalise the sitting judges of the highest court.

In response, the A-G said, "The statements which pertain to loss of faith in the Supreme Court are not contemptuous on the face of it. No part of these statements casts any blame or aspersion upon the Court."

He also additionally, the statements relating to the critiques of certain judgements would fall squarely within the purview of fair comment, permissible under Section 5 of the Contempt of Courts Act 1971 itself.

So far as the statement related to the allocation of cases is concerned, the top law officer of the country, said, "I find that the four judges of the Supreme Court in a press conference dated 12.01.2018, expressed these same views in relation to allocation of cases by the then Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra."

"Having gone through the entirety of Sibal's speech, I find that his criticism of the Court and the judgements was so that the Court may take note of the statements in the larger interests of the justice delivery system. It does not appear to me that the statements were intended to scandalize the Court or affect the confidence of the public in the institution," the A-G said.