“No one can browbeat us. These are all fragile attempts. Nobody took notice of this,” the CJI said.
NEW DELHI: Supreme Court Thursday sought responses from EC, CEC Gyanesh Kumar and election commissioners S S Sandhu and Vivek Joshi on a petition filed by INDIA bloc functionaries led by Rahul Gandhi alleging irregularities in SIR, arbitrary deletion of voters, undemocratic functioning of the poll panel and flaws in EVM use, even as it slammed the suggestion that the court could be browbeaten by deploying crowds.A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi said it was issuing notices on the petition and would await the responses. It also issued notices on all petitions questioning the SIR process in different states but clarified that it would take them up state-wise instead of bunching them together.At this juncture, senior advocate Gaurav Bhatia said a petition had been filed along with a memorandum signed by 200-odd lawyers against Rahul for bringing his supporters in large numbers onto the SC premises on Oct 12 to file the petition in an attempt to browbeat the judiciary.CJI Kant took exception to the suggestion that it could be intimidated by mobilising crowds. “No one can browbeat us. These are all fragile attempts. Nobody took notice of this,” he said.He went on to take note of comments by senior lawyers who spoke about losing trust in the judiciary only to praise the institution immediately afterwards. “We know they say something outside and something else inside the court. We are not sitting in ivory towers.
We are also aware of such things,” CJI Kant said.Recently, senior advocate Kapil Sibal had expressed disillusionment with SC but gave a statement about the court regaining people’s faith the very next day after it passed a particular order.The hearing started on an intriguing note when senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi began arguments for Rahul and other netas on alleged irregularities in EC’s collective decision-making, and was interrupted by Sibal.