The Supreme Court of India recalled the difficulties its judges faced in comprehending the judgments delivered by a now-retired judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The comment was made on Friday
by a bench comprising Chief Justice of India BR Gavai and Justice K Vinod Chandran during the hearing of an appeal.
The apex court bench was dealing with a case where a trial court had acquitted three men in a murder case, but the Punjab and Haryana High Court, under a division bench led by Justice
Sureshwar Thakur, had reversed the acquittal. The Supreme Court judges, in an attempt to understand the lower court’s reasoning, struggled with what they described as the “incomprehensible language and reasoning” used in the verdict.Chief Justice Gavai, in a moment of exasperation, remarked, “Fortunately, he (the high court judge) has demitted office.” The CJI’s comment was met with agreement from the advocates present, who also expressed their perplexity with the retired judge’s verdicts. Senior advocate Narender Hooda, appearing for a party in the case, noted that many of the judge’s decisions had been overturned by the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice went further, stating, “It is not ‘many’. Every decision of the judge, which was challenged in SC, had been overturned.”
A section of one of the judgments from Justice Thakur, cited by a news agency, provided a clear example of the dense and convoluted language that baffled the judges. The Supreme Court ultimately decided to set aside the High Court’s order and remitted the matter back to the Punjab and Haryana HC for a fresh hearing, highlighting that the reasoning provided in the impugned judgment was simply not clear enough to be understood.
