Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra met the four judges who took him on publicly (PTI)
Highlights
- Four judges had called press conference last week
- They criticised Chief Justice over sensitive cases going to junior judges
- Senior lawyers, retired judges have tried to resolve the dispute
Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra today met the four judges who had criticised him publicly, and discussed "all issues", top sources have told NDTV. "The ice has started melting," said the sources, delivering another twist in the story after Attorney General KK Venugopal said that the dispute remained unresolved. One of the main triggers of the unprecedented rift, the case related to judge BH Loya's death, was taken up today by the Supreme Court.
Here's your 10-point cheatsheet to this big story:
The Chief Justice had a "long discussion" with Justices Jasti Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan Lokur and Kurien Joseph on issues they had raised in a press conference last week.
The judges will continue their discussions tomorrow, sources said, adding that "things are moving in the right direction".
The four judges -- who are the senior most after the Chief Justice -- have been kept out of a constitution bench announced yesterday for eight important cases. It is not clear if that will change after the talks.
The judges had also chatted during an informal meeting at the Supreme Court lounge, where judges usually spend some time before going to court. Later, Mr Venugopal told reporters that everything "had been settled".
But this morning, Mr Venugopal amended: "From what has been reported in The Hindu, I accept that the judges' conflict is not settled."
The Hindu newspaper quoted sources close to the four judges as denying any reconciliation and saying that there had been "no attempts so far to resolve the issues raised by the judges".
The judges went public against the Chief Justice after the judge Loya case was assigned to Justice Arun Mishra, who is number 10 in the Supreme Court hierarchy. Speaking to the media on Friday, they criticised the way sensitive cases were being assigned "without rationale".
Judge Loya died of a cardiac arrest on December 1, 2014, while attending a wedding in Nagpur. At the time, he was handling the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case in which BJP president Amit Shah was an accused. Mr Shah was discharged by the judge who replaced judge Loya.
Last weekend, judge Loya's son Anuj denied that there was anything suspicious in the death and said it was being politicised.
Justice Arun Mishra reportedly "broke down" at the informal meet at the lounge and complained that he had been unfairly targeted. Justice Chelameswar was seen with his arm around Justice Mishra as he was led by the Chief Justice to his chamber, reported news agency IANS.
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