Bar Council chief seeks removal of acting Chief Justice of Calcutta HC – Economic Times

The chairman of the West Bengal Bar Council, Ashok Kumar Deb, has written to Chief Justice of India NV Ramana urging him to remove Rajesh Bindal, the acting Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court. In his letter on Sunday, Deb, who is also a Trinamool Congress MLA, referred to the Jammu Kashmir Bar Council Association’s ‘boycott’ of Justice Bindal due to “his behaviour”.

Deb said the way Bindal had stayed the lower court’s bail order over the Narada trial clearly shows that he favours certain political parties. Deb also alleged in his letter that Bindal was more preoccupied with “administrative commitments than judicial work” and has not been associated with “any landmark judgements”.

The letter alleged that a five-member bench headed by Bindal allowed repeated requests by the CBI for filing affidavits but didn’t allow TMC chief Mamata Banerjee and Malay Ghatak to contest the matter showing Bindal’s ‘bias’.

Deb also stated that the election-related petition filed by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee against Suvendu Adhikari was registered with the single bench of Justice Sabyasachi Bhattacharya but Justice Bindal moved it to Justice Kaushik Chanda, who is said to be close to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

In his letter, Deb pointed to Bindal’s frequent visits to the Raj Bhavan to claim that he is an out-and-out BJP man. Deb urged the CJI to take immediate action on removing Justice Bindal ‘to ensure people’s confidence in the judiciary and to preserve the sanctity of Calcutta High Court’

Meanwhile, four members of the Bar Council of West Bengal wrote to CJI that a letter written by Deb is “contemptuous and devious” and does not represent the sentiments of the majority of bar members.