New Delhi: Both cases relating to the Delhi excise policy — CBI’s revision and criminal contempt proceedings — will now be heard by different judges of Delhi High Court instead of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma.While Justice Manoj Jain is likely to take up CBI’s plea on Tuesday, a division bench headed by a senior judge has been assigned the contempt case against Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and a few other Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) functionaries.While drawing up contempt proceedings, Justice Sharma had announced she is transferring the CBI petition to another bench so that she is not accused of bias.On Monday, the high court website showed both cases have been re-assigned by the chief justice to other benches.Justice Jain is at present hearing petitions by former Union minister Lalu Prasad and businessman Robert Vadra challenging actions taken by probe agencies against them in their respective matters.The judge will examine CBI’s challenge to the discharge of Kejriwal and other accused in the case in connection with alleged irregularities in the formulation and implementation of the Delhi excise policy.The separate criminal contempt proceedings arising out of the matter have been listed before a division bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Ravinder Dudeja.The developments come days after Justice Sharma initiated criminal contempt proceedings, observing that a “coordinated social media campaign” had been carried out to scandalise the judiciary in connection with the excise policy case.She held that the actions of the proposed contemnors were “calculated to scandalise the court, lower the authority of the institution of justice, interfere with the administration of justice and intimidate the independent exercise of judicial functions”.She observed that while fair criticism of judicial orders is permissible, “there is a distinction between fair criticism and running a campaign to portray a judge as biased”.“The court cannot permit erosion of the constitutional and justice delivery systems by tolerating organised assaults in the name of public discourse,” the order said, adding that such attempts, if unchecked, could undermine public confidence in the judiciary.Justice Sharma had clarified that transfer of the main excise policy case to another bench was not a recusal at the asking of the accused persons, but a step necessitated by “judicial propriety and discipline” after initiation of contempt proceedings.“The main revision petition can always be heard by any other bench. However, the acts of the proposed contemnors, directed against this court and the institution of the judiciary, could only have been noticed and addressed by this court,” the judge pointed out, taking exception to alleged “defamatory and vilifying” material circulated against her on social media following her refusal to recuse from the matter.
