A petition has been filed before the Supreme Court seeking recall of the September 23 split verdict on the validity of the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023.

The plea comes in the wake of judicial propriety concerns arising from the discovery that the son of Justice Satish Chandra Sharma, who was part of the bench that delivered the split verdict, is Election Commission's standing counsel before the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

To recap, a 2-judge bench of Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice SC Sharma recently referred the petitions challenging the 2023 law to a larger bench.

Even though the disagreed on whether the matter should be referred, they ultimately ordered that the matter be placed before the CJI for the constitution of a Constitution Bench of appropriate strength, to avoid further delay.

The bench observed that referring the matter to a 3-judge bench on the preliminary point of reference would be a time-consuming exercise. While Justice Datta opined the Union's demand for a larger bench reference was unwarranted, Justice Sharma held otherwise.

Justice Datta also expressed concerns about the executive interference in the judges appointment process, while rejecting the Union's argument that the executive-laden body can pick ECs like the judges appoint judges.