Supreme Court Deprecates Practice Of Passing Adverse Remarks Against Judicial Officers By HC In Judgments

The Supreme Court deprecated the practice of making adverse remarks by High Courts against judicial officers.

A judicial officer who presided Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal had approached the Apex Court against certain observations made personally against her by the High Court of Karnataka.  Adverse remarks were made in the judgment in appeal against an order passed by the MACT Judge.

"We are in agreement with learned counsel for the appellant that the appellant cannot be condemned unheard. We must notice at the threshold that the language used is extremely strong and the Court should be circumspect in using such language while penning down its order qua judicial officers. We really cannot appreciate the use of this language, whatever may have been the conduct of the appellant.", the bench comprising Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and R. Subhash Reddy observed.

The court said that any criticism or observations must be judicial in nature and should not formally depart from sobriety, moderation and reserve.

"There cannot be an adverse remark made against a judicial officer without first giving an opportunity to the judicial officer to explain his conduct. In that context, in fact it has been observed that while our legal system acknowledges the fallibility of the Judges and thus, provides for appeals and revisions, the lower judicial officers mostly work under charged atmosphere and are under psychological pressure and do not have the facilities which are available in the High Court", the bench added.

Setting aside such adverse remarks, the bench observed that if the High Court really thinks that there are serious aspects arising in respect of the manner of passing of the judgment by the Tribunal, the High Court on the administrative side may issue a notice to the judicial officer and taking appropriate decision after giving her an opportunity to put forth her stand.

"It was in any case open to the Division Bench, if it found that the impugned judgment of the Tribunal had grave errors which casts some doubt on the performance of the officer, to direct the matter to be taken on the administrative side in which case notice would have been issued to the appellant to explain her conduct and she would have got an opportunity to put forth her point of view and then it would have been open on the administrative side, if so advised to whether to take some action or not.", the bench added.

Case: K.G. Shanti vs. United India Insurance Co. Ltd. [CA 929-930/2021]

Coram: Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and R. Subhash Reddy

Counsel: Sr. Adv Basava Prabhu S. Patil, Adv Chinmay Deshpande

Citation: LL 2021 SC 174

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