Chennai : Even as Parliament plunged into din for the second day over Press Council of India Chairman Justice Markandey Katju’s startling claim that a corrupt additional judge of the Madras High Court survived due to political pressure during 2004-05, DMK president M Karunanidhi on Tuesday sought to turn the tables against the former Supreme Court judge.
In a letter to his party cadres tilted ‘Neethiyin Kazhuthai Nerukum, Katjuvin Nermaiatra Karuthu’ (Strangulating Justice, Katju’s Dishonest Views), Karunanidhi accused Justice Katju of heaping praise on his rival and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa with a view to influence the outcome of a pending corruption case against her in a special court in Bangalore.
Significantly, though Justice Katju had not named the DMK as the party which put pressure on the Congress-led Manmohan Singh Government to protect the corrupt additional judge, Karunanidhi himself conceded that the reference was to his party. However, he did not venture to deny the allegations leveled against the party but questioned why Justice Katju had not identified the former additional judge so as to enable the latter to counter the charges. (In any case, the alleged corrupt judge is not alive).
Referring to a Facebook post by Justice Katju stating that the AIADMK Government in Tamil Nadu had never interfered with the administration of justice or appointment of judges while he had served as Chief Justice of the Madras High Court for a year from November 2004, Karunanidhi charged that this praise was borne out of “hidden compulsion.”
The DMK leader alleged that the praise was planned and timed to influence the verdict in the Rs 66.65 crore disproportionate assets accumulation case in which Jayalalithaa is the prime accused. The case, transferred to Bangalore to facilitate fair trial, is in its final stages.
As for the allegations relating to attempts to shield the corrupt additional judge, Karunanidhi questioned why Justice Katju was raising the issue now when he could have done so as a judge of the High Court or the Supreme Court. He wondered if Justice Katju had restrained himself from criticising the Congress when it was in power merely to get posted as Chairman of the Press Council of India.
Branding Justice Katju as an “embodiment of contradictions”, who would change his statement by the fall of dawn, Karunanidhi said the former judge had even been criticised by the BJP leader Arun Jaitley as a Congress appointee. Besides, he had once dubbed 90 per cent of Indians as fools and hailed West Bengal Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee as a person with integrity of the highest order only to criticise her as an autocrat within months. Karunanidhi said Justice Katju had also last year hit out at Jayalalithaa saying she should resign if she is unable to run the Government in accordance to the Constitution.
