New Delhi: A judge who was a member of the Supreme Court panel that criticized Nupur Sharma of the BJP for her remarks regarding the Prophet Muhammad made strong statements about personal attacks on judges for their decisions today. At a ceremony, Justice JB Pardiwala, a member of the bench that said the former BJP spokesperson needed to apologize to the entire country, remarked: “Personal attacks on judges for their judgments lead to a dangerous environment.”
Judge for the Supreme Court who heard Nupur Sharma’s plea condemns “personal attacks”
A judge who was a member of the Supreme Court panel that criticized Nupur Sharma of the BJP for her remarks regarding the Prophet Muhammad made strong statements about personal attacks on judges for their decisions today. At a ceremony, Justice JB Pardiwala, a member of the bench that said the former BJP spokesperson needed to apologize to the entire country, remarked: “Personal attacks on judges for their judgments lead to a dangerous environment.”
After making oral remarks against Nupur Sharma during the hearing of her petition, both Justices Pardiwala and Surya Kant came under fire on social media from individuals.
In order to have all First Information Reports filed against her across the nation combined and sent to Delhi, Nupur Sharma has petitioned the Supreme Court.
She also stated in her petition that she and her family have been the target of security threats and that they require protection.
In his address at a function today, Justice Pardiwala said, “Personal attacks on judges for their judgments lead to a dangerous scenario where the judges have to think about what media thinks instead of what the law really thinks. This harms the rule of law. Social and digital media is primarily resorted to expressing personalised opinions more against the judges, rather than a constructive critical appraisal of their judgments. This is what is harming the judicial institution and lowering its dignity. The remedy of judgments does not lie with social media but with higher courts in the hierarchy. Judges never speak through their tongue, only through their judgments. In India, which cannot be defined as a completely mature or defined democracy, social media is employed frequently to politicize purely legal and constitutional issues.”
He added that digital and social media needs to be regulated throughout the country to preserve the rule of law under the constitution.
“In the modern day context, trials by digital media are an undue interference in process of justice dispensation and cross that Lakshman Rekha many a times.”
Justice Pardiwala cited the Ayodhya case as an example. He said, “It was a land and title dispute but by the time the final verdict came to be delivered, the issue attained political overtones. It was conveniently forgotten that someday or the other some judge had to decide the contentious civil dispute which was indisputably the oldest litigation pending in the court of the country running into thousands of pages. This is where the heart of any judicial proceeding before the constitutional court may disappear and the judges deciding the dispute may get a bit shaken, which is antithetic to the rule of law. This is not healthy for the rule of law.”
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