From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: Former Supreme Court Chief Justice N V Ramana is in the dock for soliciting business for an arbitration centre set up on the outskirts of Hyderabad last December while holding the top judicial position for commercial disputes and securing for it 5 acres of land worth Rs 250 crore at the Hi-Tech city.
As many as 65 legal professionals have urged the Centre just as Ramana retired for a probe by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) for his role in the “misuse of public funds and assets by Telangana government, overlooking procedure and propriety.”
They have urged the Centre for a probe into the alleged “illegal acts” of Justice Ramana for his alleged role in setting up of the Hyderabad-based International Arbitration and Mediation Centre (IAMC).. Sriram Panchu, a senior advocate of the Madras High Court, took the lead in getting the representation signed by 65 on August 15.
The Centre was set up as a Trust formed by Justice Ramana, who authored its deed as a public charitable Trust. with Supreme Court judge Justice Hima Kohli and the recently retired L Nageswara Rao as its trustees. Justice Ramana wanted to make India a hub of the international arbitration cases now going to small countries like Bangkok.
The controversial IAMC was inaugurated by Justice Ramana last December in the presence of Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekar Ro at Nanakramguda on the outskirts of Hyderabad.
The representation to the Centre claims Justice Ramana was “promoting the Centre and using his official position as the CJI to solicit business for the Centre” that makes him to venture into “a business activity of administering arbitration and mediation for commercial matters by charging a feee. It claimed it goes against the Code of Conduct of the judges.
The signatories say they intend to “highlight some serious concerns affecting the rule of law, due process of law and judicial propriety, affecting the credibility of judicial administration and delivery of justice.”
They have not only sought a probe into the transfer of public land to the centre and also frame guidelines on the conduct of the judges while in office and restraining them from involving in the private ventures nd obtaining huge amount of public assets and monies.
Senior advocate Panchu asserted in an article in June that the IAMC reflects “a trend of judges using judicial office to benefit former colleagues, or themselves, by way of the post-retirement benefits.” He described how the IAMC trust apparently sought land and lrgesse from the Telangana government, which happily obliged.”
The article was rebutted in a column by retired judge Kannan, and in another by senior advocate Sankaranarayanan. Both the columns were published in LiveLaw.
