Ex-Judges Back Justice Reddy, Slam Shah's Remarks

The group, which includes former Supreme Court justices Kurien Joseph, Madan B. Lokur and J. Chelameswar, said that “prejudicial misinterpretation” of a Supreme Court verdict by a senior political functionary is likely to have a chilling effect on judges.

The Congress also criticised the home minister. In a post on X, Congress general secretary in charge of communications Jairam Ramesh said, “The Union Home Minister that our country has the great misfortune of having is a two-in-one WMD — a Weapon of Malicious Defamation as well as a Weapon of Mischievous Distortion. But there are still people in India courageous enough to call him out.”

Ramesh added that 20 of India’s most eminent legal figures, including retired Supreme Court judges and former chief justices of high courts, have now “exposed his lies” about Justice Sudershan Reddy.

Shah had accused Justice Reddy, a retired judge of the Supreme Court, of “supporting” Naxalism, claiming that Left Wing Extremism would have ended by 2020 had the Salwa Judum judgment not been delivered.

In their joint statement, the retired judges said: “The statement of Union home minister Amit Shah, publicly misinterpreting the judgment of the Supreme Court in the Salwa Judum case, is unfortunate. The judgment nowhere supports, either expressly or by compelling implication, Naxalism or its ideology.”

The signatories include former Supreme Court judges A.K. Patnaik, Abhay Oka, Gopala Gowda, Vikramjit Sen, Kurien Joseph, Madan B. Lokur and J. Chelameswar. They were joined by three former chief justices of high courts, Govind Mathur, S. Muralidhar and Sanjib Banerjee, as well as several other retired high court judges including Anjana Prakash, C. Praveen Kumar, A. Gopal Reddy, G. Raghuram, K. Kannan, K. Chandru, B. Chandrakumar and Kailash Gambhir. Prof. Mohan Gopal and Senior Advocate Sanjay Hegde also signed the statement.

The retired judges further said, “While the campaign for the office of the Vice President of India may well be ideological, it should be conducted civilly and with dignity. Criticising the so-called ideology of either candidate should be avoided.” They warned that misrepresentation of a Supreme Court ruling by a senior political leader could undermine judicial independence.

Speaking in Kerala on Friday, Mr. Shah had said, “Sudershan Reddy is the person who helped Naxalism. He gave the Salwa Judum judgment. If the Salwa Judum judgment had not been given, Naxal terrorism would have ended by 2020. He is the person who was inspired by the ideology that gave that judgment.”

Justice (Retd.) Sudershan Reddy responded on Saturday, saying he did not wish to join issue with the Home Minister, but clarified that the verdict was not his alone but that of the Supreme Court bench. He added that Mr. Shah would not have made such remarks had he read the complete judgment.

Justice Reddy, along with Justice S.S. Nijjar, was part of the Supreme Court bench that, in July 2011, ordered the disbanding of Salwa Judum, ruling that using tribal youths as Special Police Officers in the fight against Maoist insurgents was illegal and unconstitutional.