New Delhi: Seventy-six Rajya Sabha members on Monday submitted a petition to Vice President Hamid Ansari seeking impeachment of Karnataka High Court judge P D Dinakaran.
"76 members of Rajya Sabha have submitted an impeachment motion. We are also exercising our duty. Investigation should be undertaken as the result of this motion," says CPI-M politburo member Sitaram Yechury.
On Saturday, 50 MPs from the Opposition signed a petition to initiate the impeachment proceedings of Dinakaran. No Congress MP is a part of the campaign.
Leaders from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Left parties and Samajwadi Party are reportedly among the supporters of the campaign.
BJP spokesperson Arun Jaitley says that the impeachment of Justice Dinakaran will not be made into a poitical issue.
"We are following the constitutional procedure. We have not made it a political issue," says Jaitley.
The petition is a culmination of a three-month long campaign against the Karnataka High Court Chief Justice whose nomination for appointment to the Supreme Court has been widely criticised. Dinakaran is named in a number of corruption cases.
Government has already sent back his file to the Supreme Court Collegium to reconsider its decision to elevate him.
Filing of the petition is the first step towards impeachment of a judge. As per Rajya Sabha rules, if 50 members sign on a demand for a motion it becomes the property of the House and action has to be taken. A committee will then be formed to look into the merits of the case.
"We have been demanding a judicial commission and the Government has been talking about judicial reforms. There are lots of issues which the Congress party should address and they should come out with a meaningful proposal," CPI leader D Raja told CNN-IBN on Saturday.
There are a number of charges against Dinakaran including a disproportionate assets case. He is also charged with amassing 440 acres of land worth Rs 110 crore in Tiruvalluvar district in Tamil Nadu, part of which was government's land. The most recent allegation was that he ruled in favour of his friends in a land dispute case.
In February of this year a similar petition was introduced in Rajya Sabha against Calcutta High Court judge Justice Soumitra Sen. The only instance where a motion was actually put to vote in Parliament was the case of Justice V Ramaswamy and then too the motion was defeated.
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