Supreme Court: New panel to probe Sikkim Chief Justice Dinakaran case

The Supreme Court Today pronounced its verdict on Sikkim high court chief justice P D Dinakaran's petition challenging the impeachment proceedings against him for alleged corrupt practices and misconduct. A bench of justices G S Singhvi andC K Prasad had  lifts stay on proceedings against Sikkim High Court Chief Justice P D Dinakaran by the Rajya Sabha-appointed panel. The Apex court has now asked the Rajya Sabha Chairman to reconstitute the committee by replacing advocate P P Rao with another jurist. The Supreme Court also dismisses Dinakaran's plea for quashing the charges framed against him by the Committee.

Rajya Sabha chairman Hamid Ansari had in January 2010 constituted a three-member panel comprising Supreme Court judge justice Aftab Alam, Karnataka high court chief justice J S Khehar and senior advocate P P Rao to examine the 12 charges framed in the notice of motion adopted by the House.

Justice Dinakaran had challenged the proceedings on the ground that the panel had framed additional charges and was also independently conducting investigations and collecting material against him which, according to the judge, was not permissible under law. He has also sought recusal of senior counsel P P Rao.

The charges against the judge include land grabbing, accumulation of unaccounted assets, passing judicial order for extraneous considerations, following which his elevation to the Supreme Court was also stalled.

The apex court had on April 29 stayed the probe by the Rajya Sabha-appointed panel after Dinakaran expressed apprehension of a biased inquiry due to Rao's presence in the panel and that the committee had exceeded its jurisdiction