The Supreme Court on Monday, July 18, issued a stay on the observations made by Justice HP Sandesh of the Karnataka High Court, in which he criticised the state Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) and Additional Director General of Police (ADGP) of the ACB, Seemanth Kumar Singh. The Supreme Court bench, headed by Chief Justice NV Ramana and Justices Krishna Murari and Hima Kohli, observed that Justice Sandesh’s remarks were ‘irrelevant’. The observations were beyond the scope of the bail petition that he was hearing, the Supreme Court said, according to Bar and Bench.
Justice HP Sandesh had pulled up the Karnataka Anti-Corruption Bureau while hearing the bail plea of a government official who was arrested in connection with a bribery case. The High Court had called the Karnataka Anti-Corruption Bureau a "centre of corruption" and "collection centre" and had said that it is presently "headed by a tainted ADGP". The ADGP had then moved the Supreme Court against the remarks made by the High Court judge.
On Monday, staying proceedings including a service report and observations about the ACB that Justice Sandesh had asked for, the Supreme Court said, “Prima facie, the observations made were unconnected to the bail petition. The observations were not made within the ambit of bail proceedings. The conduct of the ACB officer is unconnected to the bail petition. We direct the High Court to decide the bail petition."
The court also halted legal action against the ACB and ADGP, and gave notice to the High Court Registrar, to a request to have Justice Sandesh's remarks on the ACB withdrawn. However, the court denied the appellants' motion to transfer the matter to another High Court bench.
The Karnataka judge’s remarks against the ACB had come into focus after Justice Sandesh told the open court that he had learnt of a threat to transfer him for his remarks. Later, he put the threat on record in an order passed on July 11. “A dinner was arranged by this court to bid farewell to Chief Justice on July 1, 2022. A sitting judge who came and sat by the side of me started with the word (name not recorded) he had received a call from Delhi and says the person who called from Delhi, inquired about me," Justice Sandesh had said.
Earlier in July, Justice HP Sandesh was hearing a bail petition by deputy Tehsildar Mahesh, who was caught accepting a Rs 5 lakh bribe at the office of the Bengaluru Urban Deputy Commissioner, J Manjunath. Hearing Mahesh’s bail plea, the High Court bench of Justice Sandesh had questioned why Manjunath’s name was not included in the FIR. The judge had called the ACB a “centre of corruption” and a “collection centre”, and also hinted that the agency was being headed by a “tainted ADGP”.