New Delhi: Over 1,500 lawyers from across the country, including senior members of Supreme Court Bar Association have come out in support of Prashant Bhushan. They urged the Supreme Court to “take corrective steps to prevent miscarriage of justice”.
“A Bar silenced under the threat of contempt will undermine the independence and ultimately the strength of the Supreme Court,” the statement of the lawyers said.
Among the signatories are Sriram Panchu, Arvind Datar, Shyam Divan, Menaka Guru-swamy, Raju Ramachandran, Biswajit Bhattacharya, Navroz Seervai, Janak Dwarkadas, Iqbal Chagla, Darius Khambata, Vrinda Grover, Mihir Desai, Kamini Jaiswal and Karuna Nundy.
“We are of the firm view that the judgment must not be given effect to, until a larger bench, sitting in open court after the pandemic has the opportunity to review the standards of criminal contempt. We do believe that the Supreme Court will hear the Voice of the People expressed all around in the last 72 hours on the subject and take corrective steps to prevent a miscarriage of Justice and restore the confidence and respect that Citizens have generally reposed in it,” the statement said.
“This judgment does not restore the authority of the court in the eyes of the public. Rather, it will discourage lawyers from being outspoken. From the days of the suppression of judges and the events thereafter, it has been the Bar that has been the first to stand in defence of the independence of the judiciary,” the statement said.
In their statement, the lawyers said: “An independent judiciary does not mean that judges are immune from scrutiny and comment. It is the duty of lawyers to freely bring any shortcomings to the notice of bar, bench and the public at large. While some of us may have divergent views on the advisability and content of Mr Prashant Bhushan’s two tweets, we are unanimously of the view that no contempt of court was intended or committed especially when contrasted with the normal standard that ‘Justice is not a cloistered virtue… She must be allowed to suffer the scrutiny and respectful, even though outspoken comments of ordinary men’.”
“While Mr Prashant Bhushan as a lawyer of good standing of the Supreme Court, may not be an ordinary man, his tweets do not say anything out of the ordinary, other than what is routinely expressed about the court’s working in recent years by many on public fora and on social media. Even some retired judges of the Supreme Court have expressed somewhat similar views,” the statement said.
On August 14, the bench of Justices Arun Mishra, B R Gavai and Krishna Murari held Prashant Bhushan guilty of contempt of court for two of his tweets, which the bench said, were based on “distorted facts constituted a scurrilous/ malicious… attack on the entire Supreme Court and had the effect of destabilising the very foundation of the judiciary.”
Bhushan faces six months simple imprisonment or fine upto Rs 2,000 or both as the maximum punishment for the contempt. The top court would hear the arguments on the quantum of sentence on August 20.