Opposition motion in RS to oust Justice Varma was submitted, not admitted | India News
NEW DELHI: The Lok Sabha will take up an all-party motion to remove Justice Yashwant Varma of Allahabad HC over the cash-in-house controversy. The opposition-sponsored notice for a similar motion in the Rajya Sabha hasn’t been admitted. RS secretariat, after a mandatory scrutiny, didn’t find it to be in “complete compliance with the procedure”, sources said.Former Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar’s move to allow the notice is believed to have caused unhappiness within the government. Now that it has been clarified that it was not admitted, it clears the way for LS Speaker Om Birla to choose three members of the probe panel, comprising CJI or an SC judge, an HC chief justice and a jurist, to probe the allegations of corruption against Varma. The RS chairperson would’ve had an equal say in the matter if RS secretariat ruled otherwise.All parties agree Varma ouster should be a joint call, says Rijiju The decision about Lok Sabha taking up the matter, announced by parliamentary affairs minister Kiren Rijiju, was followed by 152 members drawn from all political parties signing the motion.The issue is said to be at the core of former RS chairman and ex-Veep Jagdeep Dhankhar’s abrupt resignation on Monday. Dhankhar had accepted the motion signed by 63 opposition members against Justice Yashwant Varma despite the decision at all-party meeting on Sunday that process for the removal of the judge should begin in the LS.Dhankhar’s action of accepting opposition’s notice is said to have set in motion a chain of events, murmurs of a “secret deal” and, crucially, a move by BJP-led coalition to signal their loss of trust in the Chairman, leading to his surprise exist on “health grounds”.Rijiju reiterated Friday that there was a unanimous decision of all political parties to move for the removal of Varma, asserting that the Lok Sabha will take up the motion. The minister said all political parties had agreed that the removal of Justice Varma should be a joint call, adding that the proceedings will be taken up in the Lok Sabha and then moved to the Rajya Sabha, in line with the Judges (Inquiry) Act. “We shouldn’t remain in any doubt; proceedings will begin in the Lok Sabha,” he said.Section 3, sub-section (2) of the Act says, “If notices of motions for removal of a Judge are given on the same day in both Houses of Parliament, no committee shall be constituted unless the motion has been admitted in both Houses, and where such motion has been admitted in both Houses, the committee shall be constituted jointly by the speaker and the chairman.”
