Justice Yashwant Varma cash row: All previous attempts at impeaching judges have failed

New Delhi: Lok Sabha has initiated impeachment proceedings against Justice Yashwant Varma but Parliamentary history shows that none of the six earlier attempts to sack a judge had not been successful owing to the motion not getting adequate numbers or enquiry reports exonerating them.

While the motion against Justice Varma was admitted, another impeachment notice against Allahabad High Court judge Justice Shekhar Yadav submitted by the Opposition accusing him of communal speech.

In five of the six cases, all but one related to allegations of financial impropriety, while one was related to a complaint of sexual harassment. Only two cases came to the Parliament after enquiry, while the motion fell flat after enquiry committee found the judges clean in three cases and one after some MPs withdrew their signatures from a fourth motion.

The first impeachment attempt was in 1991 against Justice V Ramaswami, who was accused of financial impropriety in spending for his official residence when he was Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana High Court.

A committee under the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968, found him guilty but when a motion was brought in Lok Sabha, it failed as ruling Congress MPs abstained from voting, leaving the House with inadequate numbers for passing the motion though no vote was cast against the motion. An impeachment motion should get two-third majority of votes of those present to get carried.

Twenty years later in 2011, a second impeachment motion came against Calcutta High Court judge Soumitra Sen, who was found guilty by an inquiry committee set up by Rajya Sabha. The motion was passed by Rajya Sabha with required majority but before it was taken up, Justice Sen resigned, leaving the motion lapsed.

In 2015, Supreme Court judge Justice J B Paridwala, when he was in Gujarat High Court, also faced an impeachment motion over his remarks in a judgement that the quota regime was the reason that India is not progressing. The impeachment motion was dropped after Justice Pardiwala later removed the remarks from the judgement.

Justice S K Gangele of Madhya Pradesh High Court faced impeachment proceedings after a woman judicial officer accused him of sexual misconduct but a Rajya Sabha-appointed inquiry panel did not find him guilty and the motion could not be taken up in Parliament in 2017.

Being accused of discriminating a Dalit judge, Justice C V Nagarjuna Reddy of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana High Court was facing an impeachment motion but it became infructuous in Rajya Sabha after some MPs withdrew their names from the motion.

There was also an attempt to impeach then Chief Justice of India Dipak Kumar Mishra after five judges held a press conference criticising his style of working and allocation of cases. However, then Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu rejected the motion at the preliminary stage itself citing it was related to internal matters and not administrative misbehaviour among other things.

In the case of then Sikkim High Court Chief Justice PD Dinakaran, who was facing allegations of land grab, the then Rajya Sabha Chairman had set up an inquiry committee. However, Justice Dinakaran resigned in July 2011 before impeachment proceedings could be initiated against him.