The Madras High Court on Tuesday “deleted” the comments it had made against Senior Advocate and DMK Member of Parliament P Wilson for purportedly asking for a recusal in a hearing last month.
Justices R Subramanian and L Victoria Gowri of the Madurai bench also said that a probe had already been initiated by the Cyber Crime unit of the Tamil Nadu police to identify the source of the leaked video clip of the Court’s proceedings.
“A detailed memo has been filed by the appellant saying it wasn’t their intention or the intention of the counsel on record, or the senior counsel to ask for a recusal of one of us. The submissions are accepted. The order dated 26.9.2024 is recalled in part. The observations made by this Court against the Senior Counsel are deleted,” the Court said.
The Court passed the order following submissions made by Senior Advocate and Bar Council of India Vice-Chairman S Prabakaran.
Prabakaran appeared for the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC), the original appellant in the matter. He told the Court that Wilson had never asked for a recusal, but had merely pointed out facts.
“Mr Wilson absolutely did not ask for any recusal from this Court. The Court said he was disrespecting, but we have very high regards for this Court...it is the duty of this lawyer to bring on record the facts that the client gives,” Prabakaran argued.
He further said that Wilson had consistently raised issues affecting the Bar before the courts and Parliament.
Justice Subramanian said he agreed with this point. He then said that the Court had also accepted an additional memo and a complaint submitted by the advocate on record for TNPSC asking for a probe into how the video clip of the hearing in question was recorded and circulated on social media.
“As far as this additional memo is concerned, the complaint given by Mr Panneerselvam has already been forwarded to the computer committee. The computer committee is seized of the matter. An investigation has been launched with the help of the cyber crime police. We will know who recorded it in a few days time. We have already asked the cyber crime police to ensure there is no illegal broadcasting of these videos of court proceedings. The video has already been removed. I don’t think it is still on social media. We will remove the remarks,” the Bench said.
On October 1, a video clip from the hybrid hearing conducted before the Bench of Justices Subramanian and Gowri was circulated on WhatsApp, where the former was seen losing his cool and reprimanding Wilson.
The video showed Justice Subramanian shouting and accusing Wilson of playing “tricks” to seek recusal of judges, and then refusing to give him a hearing despite Wilson apologising several times.
Soon after, Bar bodies from across Tamil Nadu made representations to Madras High Court Chief Justice K Sriram and Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, objecting to how Wilson had been treated. The Bar Council of India too wrote to CJI Chandrachud asking him to act on the growing incidents of mistreatment of advocates by judges during court proceedings.