SC turns down Karnan’s interim bail plea

Karnan taken to hospital, sent back to correctional home

22/06/2017

Kolkata, Jun 21: Arrested former Calcutta High Court judge C S Karnan was taken to hospital today after he complained of chest pain and was returned to Presidency correctional home (jail) when doctors found nothing "alarming".
Earlier in the day, Karnan was flown in from Chennai after he was found hiding in Coimbatore by a team of West Bengal CID who arrested him.
"He was taken to the state-run SSKM hospital from Presidency correctional, where he was lodged, after he complained of chest pain in the evening. He underwent several round of ECG and other tests to ascertain whether he was having any problem," a CID police officer said.
"Nothing unusual was found in his medical tests and therefore he was sent to back to the correctional home," the officer said.
Karnan had been evading arrest since the May 9 Supreme Court order awarding him a six-month jail term for contempt of court.
Karnan, who earned the dubious distinction of being the first sitting high court judge to be awarded a jail term by the apex court, had retired from service on June 12 as a fugitive.
Retired Kolkata High Court judge Justice C.S. Karnan, who was arrested yesterday in connection with a contempt of court case, was lodged in Kolkata's Presidency Jail on Wednesday after the Supreme Court refused to grant him interim bail.
A vacation bench of the apex court headed by Justice D. Y. Chandrachud and Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul refused to suspend the six-month prison sentence for Justice Karnan in the case.
Mathew J Nedumpara, a lawyer appearing for Justice Karnan, mentioned the matter before the vacation bench of the top court.
Nedumpara pleaded to the apex court seeking bail and suspension of the six months jail sentence, to which the court observed, "The seven judge bench had passed the order. It binds everybody. It binds us also."
Justice Karnan was arrested by the Kolkata police in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu yesterday.
The apex court earlier on May 19 rejected Justice Karnan's plea for recall of the six-month jail term for contempt of court, stating that the petition was "not maintainable" in the court.
"I am constrained, but to hold that the present writ petition is not maintainable. The relief, if any, lies somewhere else. I, thus, see no reasonable cause to receive the present writ petition for registration under the provisions of order XV, rule (5) of the Supreme Court rules, 2013," the Supreme Court Registrar said in the order.
Justice Karnan had approached the apex court seeking recall of its order, in which he was convicted and was sentenced to six-month imprisonment.
The top court had taken suo motu cognizance of numerous letters written by him against judges of the Madras High Court and the apex court and restrained him from exercising administrative and judicial powers from February 8.
Karnan is the first ever sitting judge of a higher court in judicial history to be sentenced to jail term.
The Supreme Court today refused to entertain former Calcutta High Court judge C S Karnan's plea seeking interim bail and suspension of the six-month sentence awarded to him for contempt of court.
A vacation bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and S K Kaul said the court was duty-bound by the order of the seven-judge bench on the case and Karnan -- arrested yesterday after being on the run for more than a month -- should mention the matter before a bench of the chief justice.
The seven-judge bench had already passed an order and only the special bench could hear the plea, the judges said.
Appearing for Karnan, advocate Mathew J Nedumpara said this court had all the powers and should grant the interim bail till the reopening of the court.
To this, the vacation bench said it could not override the order of the seven-judge bench.
Karnan, 62, was arrested last night by the West Bengal CID from Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, more than a month after the Supreme Court sentenced him to six months imprisonment for contempt of court.

Photo Gallery

BSE Sensex

NSE Nifty