The main legal point established in the judgment is the importance of protecting the dignity and authority of the judiciary, and the consequences of actions that scandalize or lower the authority of the Court.

1. "The Contempt of Court jurisdiction is not exercised to protect the dignity of an individual judge, but to protect the administration of justice from being maligned". While dealing with this contempt proceedings we remind ourselves of the said observation made by a Constitution Bench of this Court in Supreme Court Bar Association v. Union of India & Ann (1998) 4 SCC 409 =1998 (4) Supreme 251.

2. One S.K. Sundaram, Advocate (hereinafter referred to as the contemner) sent a telegraphic communication to Dr. Justice A.S. Anand, the Hon'ble Chief Justice of India on 3.11.2000. As the present proceedings are founded on the wordings of that communication we feel it necessary to extract the material portion thereof. It reads thus:

"I call upon Shriman Dr. A.S. Anand Hon'ble Chief Justice of India to step down from the Constitutional Office of Chief Justice of India forthwith, failing which I will be constrained to move the criminal Court for offences under S.420, 406, 471 Indian Penal Code for falsification of your age, without prejudice to the right to file a writ of quo-warranto against you and for a direction to deposit a sum of Rs. 3 crores for usurping to the Office of Chief Justice of India even after attaining the age of superannuation."

3. Within three days of despatch of the said telegram the contemner filed a criminal complaint before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Madras (Chennai) in which he arraigned the Chief Justice of India as an accused in the case. He produced a copy of the above quoted telegram as one of the documents appended with the complaint. He averred in the complaint, inter alia, thus:

"The accused (CJI) after attaining superannuation usurped the Office of the Chief Justice of India, travelled to foreign countries, taken part in many conferences, seminars inside and outside India making appointments to the Apex Court, the High Courts and other local bodies and caused loss to the exchequer to the tune of not less than three crores of rupees, apart from drawing salary and enjoying other perquisites and the same is estimated at not less than Rs. 1.50 crores which the accused is bound to indemnify to the Government of India; and the complainant reserves the right to take proceedings for recovery of the same. The complainant states that in order to squat without any legal right or justification, but solely on the basis of giving a deliberate false age, the accused is occupying the highly respected Office of Chief Justice of India. The complainant charges the accused for offences under S.420 406, 466, 468 and 471 of the Indian Penal Code and prays that this Hon'ble Court may be pleased to issue notice against the accused and he be dealt with according to law and thus render justice."

4. On a note put up by the Registrar General of the Supreme Court regarding the said telegraphic communication the matter was taken up on the judicial side and we passed an order on 7.11.2000 that prima facie we are satisfied that the contents of the said telegram sent by S.K. Sundaram, Advocate, amount to gross contempt of Court. Hence we issued notice to Mr. S.K. Sundaram, Advocate. In the same proceedings we directed the Registry to inform Mr. Harish N. Salve, Solicitor General of India to assist the Court in these proceedings.

5. The contemner filed a written reply to the notice issued to him. Therein he said, inter alia, that he had sent a telegram and it was followed up with the criminal complaint filed before the Magistrate concerned. The contemner endeavoured to justify his actions by saying that he had done what he believed to be right and fair within the bounds of his knowledge of law and language. In the succeeding paragraph the contemner tried to defend his actions stating that he had earlier filed a writ petition on behalf of his client relating to the question of age of Dr. Justice A.S. Anand and that Writ Petition was dismissed. We reproduce here what the contemner has stated on that aspect in his reply:

"The