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SC again holds no sexual harassment of staff by then CJI Gogoi
KT NEWS SERVICE. Dated: 2/19/2021 3:47:11 PM
NEW DELHI, Feb 18: The Supreme Court on Thursday once again absolved then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of the charge of sexual harassment of a staff member posted at his residence.
A Bench of Justices S K Kaul, A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian accepted the report of a committee headed by former Apex Court judge A K Patnaik holding that a conspiracy cannot be ruled out in the sexual harassment charges levelled against Justice Gogoi in April 2019.
The Patnaik committee report said it could be because of tough stand taken by then CJI on judicial and administrative side. In its order, the Court said Justice Patnaik acknowledged a wider conspiracy behind the sexual harassment charges levelled against retired CJI Gogoi.
Justice Patnaik said he did not have the mandate to probe the conspiracy as already a 3-judge committee headed by Justice Sharad A Bobde had already given a clean chit to Justice Gogoi.
The Court noted that an Intelligence Bureau (IB) report submitted to the Justice Patnaik committee had stated that some people were unhappy with then CJI Gogoi because of his tough stand in finalisation of NRC-Assam and there could have been part of hatching conspiracy to defame him.
The Justice Patnaik committee is also reported to have said that then CJI Gogoi's tough decisions to streamline the top court's registry could also have triggered the hatching of the conspiracy.