Judgment

MOHAN

( 1 ). Impelled by a desire to espouse a public cause, so the petitioner claims, this writ petition has come to be preferred. The cause relates to the motion of impeachment of Mr Justice V. Ramaswami, a Judge of this court.

( 2 ). Notice was given by 108 members of the Ninth Lok Sabha for presenting an address to the President for removal of Mr Justice V. Ramaswami. On 12/03/1991 the motion was admitted. The Committee was constituted in terms of Section 3 (2 of the Judges (Inquiry) Act. After the Committee rendered its finding the motion was to be taken up by the Members of Parliament for consideration on 10/05/1993.

( 3 ). The petitioner alleges that he served on the Speaker of the Lok Sabha a nine-page communication for circulation to the Members of the Parliament. On 8/05/1993 the Congress (1 publicly announced the members of Parliament to cast "a conscience vote" while the AIADMK party had announced that it would abstain from voting. The petitioner coming to know about the non-circulation of the petitioners papers by the Speaker, circulated the sets of the papers to the press and the other media so that the Members of Parliament might know about these papers and demand it from the Speaker before casting the conscience vote. The petitioner urges that the press did not publish and the other media did not announce the news of the papers presented to the Speaker. The impeachment proceedings were taken up. After the learned counsel for the Judge concluded his arguments, the voting was to take place. The Congress party issued an oral whip to abstain from voting. It is this abstention, which is questioned by the petitioner in this writ petition.

( 4 ). The petitioner would urge had the petitioners papers been circulated, the Members of Parliament would have refused to obey the last minute oral whip.

( 5 ). The Speakers permission to allow a counsel to appear for the Judge and argue the case before the House was not permitted either by the Judges (Inquiry) Act or the Constitution. This possibly helped the members of Parliament to obey the last minute oral whip as there was no counsel appointed to speak on behalf of the House and no debate was allowed. Issuance of oral whip was illegal.

( 6 ). The proceedings before the Parliament are quasi-judicial in nature. Therefore, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha ought to have intervened and a ordered the Members of Parliament present in the House to vote. The Speaker failed in his duty because the Members of Parliament had failed to determine the mandate on the motion of impeachment by the illegal oral whip by Congress (1 and AIADMK partys earlier decision to abstain. The Constitutional Process has been set at naught. On these allegations, the petitioner makes the following prayers:

(I) to circulate the petitioners papers to all the MPs and then get the voting process only, repeated afresh and anew, to determine and decide the motion to impeach Mr Justice V. Ramaswami;

(II) or, call only those MPs who being present in the House abstained to vote, along with others, who were then absent for one reason or the other but now choose to come and vote, to cast their votes. Adding these fresh votes to those who had already voted for or against should the result/judgment be announced;

(III) for either of the above processes taking place, the Congress (1 along with AIADMK party and other vote abstaining MPs be asked to bear the expenses in toto for the fresh and/or additional voting processes proportionately as per the number of abstaining MPs of the concerned parties to actually spell out practically the measure of austerity which was commonly announced policy of all the political parties.

THE petitioner appearing in person would reiterate the same points in his oral submission.

( 7 ). The short question that arises for consideration is as to the nature of proceedings relating to impeachment of the Judge. We are relieved of the necessity of deciding this question by ourselves because the matte