Supreme Court To Hear Plea Challenging Elevation Of Victoria Gowri As Madras HC Judge Tomorrow

The Supreme Court collegium on Tuesday will hear a plea challenging the elevation of Victoria Gowri as a judge of the Madras High Court.  

A section of the Madras High Court lawyers had last week sent a representation to the Supreme Court Collegium as well as to the president, Droupadi Murmu, seeking recall of the recommendation made for the elevation of Victoria Gowri as a high court judge.

They stated that advocate Gowri has made hate speech against Christians and Muslims in the past and she also has an open affiliation with the BJP.

The writ petition filed by advocate Anna Mathews, advocate Sudha Ramalingam and advocate D Nagasila seeks to set aside the recommendation concerning Gowri as unconstitutional due to a lack of effective consultation in accordance with Article 217 of the Constitution.

The petitioners also seek to declare that Gowri is disqualified from being considered for appointment as a judge because of her prejudices against minorities.

According to the petition, “A person who harbours “ill-will” toward certain groups of people because of their religion cannot provide fair and impartial justice, which is a fundamental tenet of the constitution.”

The top court advanced its hearing because of an urgent listing request made by Senior Advocate Raju Ramachandran for a writ petition challenging Gowri’s appointment as Madras High Court judge.

“There are certain developments which have taken place, in the sense that the collegium has taken cognizance of what was drawn to our attention, or came to our notice, after we formulated our recommendations on the recommendation of the Chief Justice of the collegium of High Court of Madras. Since we have taken cognizance of certain developments which have taken place thereafter, we can list this petition tomorrow morning. I will constitute a bench. Let that go before the appropriate bench”, CJI told Ramachandran.

Earlier, Ramachandran raised the issue at noon, and the CJI agreed to hear it on Friday. Meanwhile, Union Law Minister Kiren Rijiju announced on Twitter that Gowri and a few others have been appointed as additional High Court judges.

In light of this development, the senior counsel brought up the subject again at 2 p.m. He cited a Supreme Court decision to say that in the past, there has been judicial intervention to prevent the President from issuing a warrant of appointment after a person was found to be eligible.

Advocate Ramachandran argued that in the case of Gowri, certain “vital information” was withheld from the Supreme Court collegium, preventing the collegium from making an informed decision. As a result, the recommendation was made without any meaningful consultation.