NEW DELHI: A sting operation, showing how the lower judiciary could be exploited to obtain arrest warrants against anyone for a bribe, has boomeranged on the journalist with the Supreme Court adamant on his unconditional apology for bringing the entire judiciary to disrepute.
A Bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justices R V Raveendran and J M Panchal was on Thursday unmoved and unimpressed by journalist Vijay Shekhar's plea that it was done with the hope that the superior judiciary would take suitable corrective action to stop such misuse of the judicial process.
“You must submit your unconditional apology. You have done a serious mistake. Going around paying bribes to advocates, as you have accepted in your affidavit, is not a bona fide conduct,” the CJI said refusing to accept the journalist's affidavit explaining the sting operation. The Bench gave him four more weeks’ time to file a fresh affidavit.
In his sting operation at the Meghani Nagar court complex in Ahmedabad, Shekhar had paid money to advocates to draft a complaint that was fictitious, on the basis of which arrest warrants were issued by a magistrate against the then President, Chief Justice of India and other VIPs.
Shekhar had first brought this to the apex court's notice before going ahead with the telecast. Taking serious view of the alleged malpractice, the court had ordered a CBI inquiry, during which the magistrate remained under suspension.
The CBI confirmed the incident but gave a clean chit to the magistrate. During the last hearing on July 26, the apex court had blamed the journalist for bringing the entire judiciary into disrepute through the sting operation in 2004 saying a rare mistake was blown out of proportion to paint the entire system black.
The CBI, which gave a clean chit to the magistrate, has chargesheeted three lawyers accusing them of getting a false complaint filed before the judge and convincing him to issue bailable warrants.
An angry CJI had on July 26 asked, "Why should the magistrate suffer for two years as he was put under suspension after the sting operation, which painted the entire system as corrupt? What is the public good the journalists have done?"
