Two years of tumult: The travails of a Chief Justice attempting to clean things up

The end of this month will mark two years as Chief Justice of the Madras High Court for Sanjay Kishan Kaul J. And it has been far from smooth sailing for the former Chief Justice of the Punjab & Haryana High Court..During his tenure, Justice Kaul has, on multiple occasions, found himself on the receiving end of protesting members of the Bar. The methods by which they have expressed their dissent are reprehensible to say the least..The worst of these occurred just this week, when a section of lawyers protesting against the newly notified disciplinary rules of the High Court, reportedly burnt an effigy of Justice Kaul. This, despite his giving assurances that the reservations expressed by the Bar regarding the new rules would be looked into. For this purpose, he has set a five-member committee comprising Justices S Manikumar, S Nagamuthu, Rajiv Shakhder, PN Prakash and MM Sundaresh..In fact, a couple of weeks ago, a delegation of senior lawyers from the High Court met the Chief Justice to discuss the Bar’s objections to the new rules. They had even submitted a detailed proposal (read below) to CJ Kaul..Senior Advocate P Wilson, one of the members of that delegation said,.“The Chief Justice has made assurances that lawyers would not be approached against under the new Rules until the committee deliberates on the issues put forward by members of the Bar. Despite this, these lawyers have committed this atrocious act.”.But this is not the first time Justice Kaul has been the subject of undue criticism from the Bar..In February 2015, a group of advocates raised slogans against him, demanding that he “go back to Kashmir”. This was after he refused to give into the demands of lawyers protesting against the allocation of judges to the High Court. In reaction to the sloganeering, he noted in court that efficient people were not willing to become judges because of the behaviour of certain advocates..And it is not just the Bar who has had a bone to pick with the Chief Justice. Former sitting judge CS Karnan last year made known the “harassment and belittlement” meted out to him by Justice Kaul, after the controversial judge stayed the CJ’s decision to constitute a five-member committee for interviewing potential civil judges. He was subsequently pulled up by the Supreme Court for interfering with the Chief Justice’s duties..So why has Justice Kaul constantly found himself in the line of fire, despite working in the best interests of the legal community and the litigants?.Over the past few years, the first instinct of certain sections of the Bar has been to go on agitations and disrupt the functioning of the High Court. Justice Kaul has looked to change this culture, whether by introducing CISF security on campus or by passing the new sub-rules under the Advocates Act, in an attempt to deal with these unscrupulous elements. Further, he has been in talks with the Bar Council of India to improve the state of legal education in Tamil Nadu, in an attempt to stem the rot at the very base..On the administrative side, he made clear his intentions of steering away from petty caste politics that plague the institution. He also has proven to be a progressive and relief-oriented judge..Unfortunately, his initiatives have not been met with dialogue, but with conduct unbecoming of advocates. The reactions to these attempts to change things can be construed as nothing more than a territorial show of strength. It is surely up to the state bar council and the advocates associations to get behind their Chief Justice and reel in the undesirable elements of the Bar..To quote Justice Kaul himself, after he was asked to go back to Kashmir,.“I do not have any objection to go anywhere, but my worry is only about the great institutional tradition of the Madras High Court. It is up to you to save the tradition or degrade it.”.(You can also read The NewsMinute’s profile of CJ Kaul).Read the representation submitted to the Chief Justice: