On Wednesday, the Andhra Pradesh High Court observed that the recent transfer of Chief Justices of High Courts of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana would delay proceedings in the three capitals case and the CBI cases pending against Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy, giving him an “undue advantage”. The scathing observation was made by Justice Rakesh Kumar, while rejecting an application moved by the AP Government to recuse himself from a case involving the sale of government land in Guntur and Visakhapatnam districts.
Justice Kumar also observed that Andhra Pradesh High Court and Supreme Court is “under attack” by those in power.
“We are not aware as to whether any contempt proceeding for such an action (Jagan’s letter to CJI) has been taken or not by the Chief Justice of India. But, it is a fact that recommendation has been made on December 14 by the Collegium of Supreme Court for transfer/appointment of Chief Justices, which includes transfer of Chief Justice of AP High Court to Sikkim High Court and transfer of Chief Justice of Telangana High Court to Uttarakhand High Court. Whether by this act of sending an unceremonious letter to the Chief Justice of India, the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh will get final relief or not but fact remains that he succeeded in getting undue advantage at the present moment. People may draw an inference as if after the so called letter of Chief Minister, the two Chief Justices, i.e., Chief Justice of High Court for the State of Telangana and Chief Justice of High Court of AP have been transferred. By the said transfer, naturally, the cases pending in the Court of Special Judge for CBI cases in Hyderabad against Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy and others may be delayed and monitoring by the Supreme Court in W.P (Civil) No.699 of 2016 may hamper for the time being,” he observed.
In an unprecedented move, the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, on October 6, had written to Chief Justice of India (CJI) S A Bobde alleging that the state High Court was being used to “destabilise and topple’ his democratically elected government. Andhra Pradesh High Court’s Chief Justice J K Maheshwari was transferred to the Sikkim High Court, weeks after the letter to CJI.