Row will be sorted out soon, CJI assures lawyers

Lawyers' representatives met Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra and other judges on Sunday and were assured that there would be a congenial atmosphere in the Supreme Court.

All issues raised by the four seniormost judges would be resolved soon, they said.

A seven-member delegation of the Bar Council of India (BCI) held a meeting with CJI and a number of other judges in its efforts to end the crisis that struck the highest judiciary after four seniormost judges Justices J Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan B Lokur and Kurian Joseph on Friday questioned "arbitrary" allocations of cases to select benches.

A possibility of full court meeting was also expressed on Monday where Chief Justice Misra might meet with all other judges to address the concerns.

Two other judges of the apex court, Justices S A Bobde and L Nageswara Rao, also met Justice Chelameswar who led the four judges in the unprecedented press conference, at his residence here.

Hectic parleys took place throughout the day, with lawyers meeting different judges, including Justice Arun Mishra who heard Mumbai special judge B S Loya's death case.

Supreme Court Bar Association president Vikas Singh went to meet the CJI at his residence and handed over the resolution passed by the executive committee.

"I met the CJI and handed over a copy of the resolution. He said that he would look into it and ensure there was congeniality in the Supreme Court at the earliest," Singh said after his 15-minute meeting with the CJI.

The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA), at an emergency meeting on Saturday, passed a resolution and expressed "grave concern" over the differences of four seniormost judges with the CJI and said the issue should be immediately considered by the full court of the apex court.

The SCBA executive committee resolved that all public interest litigation (PIL) matters, including the pending PILs, should be either taken up by the CJI or be assigned for adjudication to four senior judges who are part of the apex court Collegium.

After meeting the CJI late in the evening, BCI chairman Manan Kumar Mishra said, "We met the CJI and he said there would be a very congenial atmosphere in the Supreme Court and everything will be sorted."

Mishra, however, added, "The BCI has a limited role. We can't interfere much. This is an internal issue. All judges whom we met said everything will be sorted out."