Gyanvapi-Kashi Title Dispute | 'Procedural Aberration, Jurisdictional Impropriety': Allahabad HC CJ Specifies Reasons For Withdrawing Cases From Single-Judge

In a significant order, the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court has specified the reasons for the withdrawal of the cases concerning the Kashi Vishwanath-Gyanvapi land title dispute (from the bench of Justice Prakash Padia) by stating that the decision was taken by him (CJ) on the administrative side "in the interest of judicial propriety and judicial discipline as well as the transparency in the listing of cases".Chief Justice Pritinker Diwaker, in his order dated August 28, a copy of which was made available earlier today, has reasoned that non-observance of the procedure in listing the cases, passing of successive orders for reserving the judgment and again listing the cases before the Judge (Justice Prakash Padia) for hearing through he no longer had the jurisdiction as per the master of the roster, had led to the withdrawal of the cases."The non-observance of procedure in listing of the cases, passing of successive orders for reserving the judgment and again listing the cases before the learned Judge for hearing, though he no longer had jurisdiction in the matter as per the roster, under the directions received from the chamber of learned Judge, without allowing the parent section in the office to have access to the records of these cases are instances of non-observance of procedure settled for listing and hearing of cases," the order reads.The order of the Chief Justice, which essentially deals with the objections to the transfer of the cases to his bench, also refers to the administrative order passed by him on August 11, withdrawing the cases from the bench of Justice Prakash Padia. For the uninitiated, as reported by LiveLaw on August 25, the Kashi Vishwanath-Gyanvapi Mosque land title dispute cases were transferred to the bench of Chief Justice. This development had come exactly a month after a different bench (comprising Justice Prakash Padia), which had been hearing the matter since August 2021, concluded the hearing and reserved the orders in the matter on July 25.Coincidently, a bench of Justice Padia was to deliver the verdict in the matters on August 25 itself. The reason for the transfer of matters to a different bench could not be ascertained then, however, as mentioned above, the rationale for such a decision has now been disclosed.On August 28, when the matters came up for hearing before the CJ bench, the Anjuman Intezamia Masjid committee (which manages Gyanvapi Mosque in Varanasi) had raised an objection that the cases ought not to have been withdrawn from the bench of Justice Prakash Padia, on the administrative side, by the Chief Justice, for being heard all over againIn his 12-page order, the Chief Justice has stated that essentially his order on the administrative side emanated from a complaint which was made before him on July 27, 2023, by a counsel of one of the parties to the proceedings, highlighting the fact that hearing in the dispute cases was proceeding in derogation of the procedure laid down in law for listing of the cases as per the rules.Let's understand the chronology of the circumstances which led to the withdrawal of cases from the single Judge (Justice Prakash Padia)What did the complaint filed before the CJ say?In the complaint, the primary argument raised by the counsel for one of the parties was that after 35 hearings in the matter, Justice Padia reserved the Judgment in the matter for the first time in March 2021, however, the Judgment was not delivered for 7 months and the matter was again directed to be listed along with other writ petitions in October 2021. Thereafter, the case was heard for around 12 months and judgment was reserved on November 28, 2022 and the matter was against listed in May 2023 and again the judgment was reserved in July this year.Further, referring to the Apex Court's Judgment in the case of Umesh Rai vs State of U.P. 2023 Live Law SC 448 wherein it was held that a judgment must be pronounced within a period of six months failing which the matter should be placed before another bench for fresh arguments, the complaint argued that since in the instant matter, the said 6 month period lapsed on May 26, the cases should now be assigned to another bench as the judgment had been reserved in this case thrice and the order of the Apex Court had been violated blatantly.CJ calls for an explanation of the RegistryWhile dealing with the aforementioned complaint, a report was called from the office of the registry to explain as to why did it not place the matter before the Chief Justice to pass appropriate orders in terms of the administrative order of December 2013 (regulating the listing of cases before the Judges as per the roster).The report submitted by the registry before the CJ, among other things, specified that these cases could not have been listed before the Single Judge without obtaining an appropriate nomination from the Chief Justice as per the roster notified on November 22, 2021, and subsequent rosters notified by the Chief...

Gyanvapi-Kashi Title Dispute | 'Procedural Aberration, Jurisdictional Impropriety': Allahabad HC CJ Specifies Reasons For Withdrawing Cases From Single-Judge

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