Supreme Court Accepts Resignation Of Nagaland Lokayukta Justice (Retd) Uma Nath Singh

The Supreme Court on Monday accepted the offer made by Nagaland Lok Ayukta Justice(Retired) Uma Nath Singh to resign from the post amid the ongoing dispute between him and the Nagaland Government.

Senior Advocate Vikas Singh, appearing for the Lok Ayukta, submitted the proposal to resign in a written statement presented before a bench headed by the Chief Justice of India.

Accepting the offer, the bench directed the Nagaland Government to take further steps on the resignation of Justice Singh, who was formerly the Chief Justice of the Meghalaya High Court and a judge of the Allahabad High Court.

The bench also allowed Justice Singh to go to the Lok Ayukta office to collect his personal belongings and ordered that he should be given adequate protection when he reaches the state.

Senior Advocate Vikas Singh also agreed for the expunging of the remarks made by Lok Ayukta against the Advocate General of Nagaland K N Balagopal and the Advocate on Record who filed the petition in the Supreme Court for the State Government against him. Based on that, the SC allowed the expunction of the adverse remarks.

The developments happened in a writ petition filed by Nagaland Government seeking directions to "to ensure that the institutional integrity of the post of Nagaland Lokayukta" in view of the discord with Justice Singh.

During an earlier posting, the CJI had suggested that Justice Singh resign from the post, after he insisted that he can only function from New Delhi.

In the statement submitted before the Court later, Justice Singh said that he was willing to step down as suggested by the apex court provided the state government or others are restrained from initiating any kind of action or "defaming him in media" based on the pending plea.

When Senior Advocate Vikas Singh urged the bench to pass an order to avoid misreporting of the proceedings in the case, the CJI replied : "How we wish we could pass an order against misreporting!"

The top court also quashed a criminal case pending before a Magistrate Court in Kohima involving one of the earlier personal security officers of the Lok Ayukta, after Justice Singh expressed no objection to the quashing in view of the apology made by the accused.

Senior Advocate Vikas Singh submitted that his client was making the proposals despite his objections to the maintainability of the writ petition filed by the State.