Sibal, Singhvi appear for Yatin Oza before agitated Justice Dipak Misra

Justice Dipak Misra today took strong exception to certain remarks by Senior Advocate Yatin Oza against the Gujarat High Court. The comments in question were part of Oza’s letter written to the Chief Justice of India TS Thakur concerning the transfer of a sitting judge of Gujarat High Court..The case pertains to the contempt proceedings initiated against Oza by the Gujarat High Court for his two letters to the Chief Justice of India concerning transfer of High Court judges Justices MR Shah and KS Jhaveri..Oza had appealed to the Supreme Court against the Gujarat High Court’s order and had gotten a stay on the contempt proceedings..When the matter came up for hearing today, Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Manu Singhvi appeared for Oza. They submitted that Oza was seeking support of the Bar as regards raising the issue with either the Collegium or the Central government..Singhvi submitted,.“I am asking for a decision of the Bar. Why can’t I have a voting to obtain support of the Bar. I am the President of the Bar. I am only seeking sanction of the Bar to take up the issue with two authorities – either Collegium or Central government.”.Singhvi also assailed the contention of the Respondent that contempt has been initiated previously also against Oza..“One of the main contentions by the Respondent is that I have been hauled up before for contempt. How is it relevant? I have been President of the Bar 16 times. .I cannot help that Bar likes me. Of course, there has been contempt against me before. I take up issues of the Bar, which somebody might not like”, said Singhvi..Senior Advocate Harin Raval, appearing for Respondent, Khemchand Rajaram Khosti, attacked the language used by Oza in his letter..He read out the contents of the letter, including the part where Oza had questioned Gujarat High Court’s credibility after Justice Dharmadhikari had left as Chief Justice and until Justice Mukhopadhaya took over..This upset Justice Misra. He proceeded to ask Singhvi whether the contents of letter is admitted by Oza. On answering in the affirmative, Misra J. proceeded to grill Singhvi..“This is contempt on the face of it. How can a President of the Bar support such language. Don’t kill the institution. He may be the Bar President but he does not have the right to kill the institution. How can you blame the institution?”, asked Justice Misra..Singhvi replied that most of the letter is about the transfer of a judge and not against the High Court..“Nearly the entire attack is on one person. The overwhelming bulk of the letter is about that one person.”.The Court proceeded to adjourn the case for August 31. It will consider issuing notice to the Bar Council of India in the next hearing..Image taken from here.