Media outside the residence of Delhi High Court judge Justice Yashwant Varma, in New Delhi. Pieces of burnt currency note was found among debris near Varma’s residence.
| Photo Credit: PTI
A writ petition was filed in the Supreme Court on Monday (March 24, 2025), seeking a direction to the police to register a First Information Report (FIR), and investigate allegations of “huge sums of unaccounted money” found on the official residential premises of sitting Delhi High Court judge, Justice Yashwant Varma, after a fire broke out on the night of March 14.
The petition, filed by Supreme Court advocate Mathews J. Nedumpara, further challenged the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court-appointed three-member committee to inquire into the affair.
The petition said the committee has no jurisdiction to investigate the incident. The responsibility fell on the police to effectively and meaningfully investigate the allegations.
“The three-member committee constituted by the Collegium has no jurisdiction to conduct an investigation into the incident that occurred on March 14 at the official residence of Justice Yashwant Varma, where heaps of currency notes were by chance recovered in a fire constituting various cognisable offences under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. The resolution of the Collegium investing the committee power to conduct such an investigation is rendered void ab initio inasmuch as the Collegium cannot confer jurisdiction upon itself to order so where the Parliament or the Constitution has conferred none,” Mr. Nedumpara, who is a petitioner-in-person, argued.
The petition urged the apex court to invoke its powers on the judicial side to prohibit the committee from interfering with the sovereign policing function of the State to register and investigate a crime.
Mr. Nedumpara also asked the Supreme Court to re-look a Constitution Bench judgment of 1991 in the K. Veeraswami case, which had held that no criminal case should be registered against a High Court judge, Chief Justice of a High Court, or a Supreme Court judge without prior consultation with the Chief Justice of India.
“Equality before law and equal protection of law is the core of our Constitution. All are equal before law and the criminal laws apply equally to all, irrespective of one’s status, position, etc. The only exception, nay immunity, in our constitutional scheme is extended to the President and the Governors, the sovereign who represents ‘we the people’. ‘Be ye never so high, the law is above you’,” the petition said.
It said the 1991 judgment fettered the police and amounted to creating a “special class of privileged men/women, immune from the penal laws of the land”.
The petition said the common man had been left with several questions about the fire incident and alleged discovery of cash on March 14.
“Why was no FIR registered on March 14? Why were no arrests made? Why was the money not seized? Why was no mahazar prepared? Why was the criminal law not put in motion? Justice Varma in his explanation has stated that it is not his money, that he never kept any money, he is fully taken aback by it. Then why did he not report to the police and seek the registration of an FIR of an attempt to falsely implicate him,” Mr. Nedumpara asked in his petition.
The plea asked the court to direct the government to take steps to revive the Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill, 2010, which had lapsed, in a bid to curb corruption in the judiciary.
Published – March 24, 2025 04:47 pm IST