New Delhi: Amid continuing confusion and drama over his whereabouts, Calcutta High Court Judge Justice C.S. Karnan moved the Supreme Court on Thursday to seek a recall of the top court’s May 9 order that ordered him jailed for six months on contempt charges.
The SC agreed to hear the plea, but did not give a date for hearing, the latest in an extraordinary tussle in India’s higher judiciary.
When his lawyer Mathews Nedumapara made a mention before a bench that Justice Karnan has filed an application to recall the order, CJI J.S. Khehar asked about the judge’s whereabouts. The counsel said he was in Chennai. But the police has been unable to trace him there. Justice Karnan travelled to Chennai from Kolkata hours before the SC order, stayed in a guesthouse, but has not been seen after that.
Earlier in the day, Justice Karnan’s legal adviser W. Peter Ramesh Kumar said he might have crossed the border to Bangladesh or Nepal with plans to approach the President for relief.
Lawyer Mathews Nedumapara said Justice Karnan signed an affidavit before a notary. on Wednesday, and produced the vakkalatnama's copy before the bench.
