New Delhi: The soon to retire CJI Misra before stepping down, giving way to the next CJI of SC, on Monday said that the independence of the Indian judiciary “stands erect” amid the “collegiality” among the SC judges.
He was speaking at the farewell organized by Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) on his last day at service where the outgoing CJI said, “The independence of judiciary stands erect and that shall stand erect, and there is the collegiality amongst the brother and sister judges of the court, and the Supreme Court stands supreme, not (just) today, but in times ever to come.”
“Popular perceptions, or capacity to build narratives, or any particular leaning, can never guide the course of justice. That is how the neutrality, ethicality and the purity of the stream of justice is maintained. That is how the independence of the judiciary is maintained,” he said.
Justice Misra further said that he has always dealt with cases with equity. “The tears of a poor man are equal to the tears of a rich man. Tears are tears and, to me, tears are pearls. I have to collect them with equity, justice and my Constitutional perception,” he said.
Meanwhile, praising the outgoing CJI, the next designated Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi said, he had “displayed exemplary erudition and remarkable fortitude since his elevation to the bench in 1996”.
“As a judge, his greatest contribution to Indian jurisprudence has been on issues of Constitutional significance, particularly with regard to civil liberties,” he said.
Justice Gogoi and three other senior judges had earlier held a press conference raising questions on various issues and functioning of CJI Misra, particularly the allocation of cases. “It’s a discharge of debt to the nation which we have done,” Justice Gogoi had then said on January 12.