VS case: Lawyers’ association petitions High Court CJ

The Indian Association of Lawyers (IAL) Kerala Chapter has approached the Kerala High Court Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice A M Shaffique against the numbering of state government’s appeal in the land allotment case against Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan.

It was the Division Bench comprising Manjula Chellur and Shaffique that stayed an order of the Single Judge which quashed the FIR against Achuthanandan in the case.

“The action of the registry of the Kerala High Court in numbering the appeal even in the absence of a certified copy of the Single Judge’s order and without the English translation of Malayalam documents, is highly objectionable.

“By doing so, the registry has lowered the dignity of the court in the eyes of the public,” IAL said.

It also questioned the propriety of admission of the appeal filed by the state government challenging the Single Judge’s order on the same day itself without following the procedures in this regard.

 The representation by IAL general secretary A Jayasankar said: “In view of the High Court Rules 1971, for preferring an appeal against the verdict of a Single Judge, under Section 5 of the Kerala High Court Act, the certified copy of the judgment is to be produced along with the memorandum of an appeal. In view of the settled legal principle, a memorandum of appeal without the certified copy of the impugned judgment cannot be treated even as a proper appeal. In such circumstances, as is usually done, the registry of this court would object to the maintainability of the same.”

 The conduct of the registry is highly suspicious especially since the urgency in considering an appeal of the said nature was important only for the political masters.

In the event of the Chief Justice instructing the registry to number the appeal, it is only fair and just that the bench does not hear the appeal, the representation said.