Arts & Crafts

Civil rights activist and lawyer Prashant Bhushan on Thursday complained that petitions challenging the invocation of the anti-terror law UAPA and criminal charges against journalists, advocates and others had been de-listed from a bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and posted before other judges in violation of rules.

Bhushan has in a letter to the registrar (judicial) of the Supreme Court taken exception to the listing of the case, Mukesh and Others vs State of Tripura and Others, and related matters on October 31 and November 29 before benches other than that of the Chief Justice of India (CJI).

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A day earlier, senior advocate Dushyant Dave had shot off an angry letter to Justice Chandrachud complaining that several matters relating to human rights violations, freedom of speech and democracy had recently been de-listed from benches that had originally heard them and were being listed before other benches in breach of Supreme Court rules.

The CJI alone can allocate cases and benches to judges as he is the "master of the roster".

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The main matter relates to a petition challenging the criminal and terror cases registered at Agartala police station against Mukesh Kumar, an advocate who had published a fact-finding report on communal violence in Tripura, and a journalist who had criticised the Tripura government’s alleged inaction towards protecting Muslim citizens during the violence.