It mandates that cases involving Ministers, MPs and MLAs require prior consent of Chief Justice

In an unusual move, the Madras High Court has issued a circular directing its officials in the principal seat of the court in Chennai as well as the Madurai Bench not to entertain cases in which Union as well as State ministers, Members of Parliament and Members of Legislative Assemblies have been cited as parties, without obtaining the prior consent of the Chief Justice.

P. Rajamanickam, Registrar (Judicial) of the principal seat of the High Court in Chennai, issued the circular dated March 21 with a clear direction that the Appeal Examiners and Heads of the Filing Sections of the Registry, both in Chennai and Madurai, should number the cases involving Ministers, MPs and MLAs only after getting the Chief Justice’s approval.

Time-consuming process

 “As directed by the Honourable Acting Chief Justice, all the Appeal Examiners/Heads of the Filing Sections of the Registry, both in the principal seat and the Madurai Bench, are hereby directed to submit the entire papers at the SR stage [the stage when a temporary number is assigned to a case] in respect of the cases wherein MLAs, MPs and sitting Ministers (both Central and State) are parties before the Hon’ble Chief Justice for Lordship’s approval and only after such approval, the same may be numbered,” the circular read.

The Registrar had also ordered that the instructions issued by him should be adhered to scrupulously by the officials concerned.

Surprised over the ‘peculiar’ circular, some court officials said that it would be a time-consuming process to send the case bundles filed in the Madurai Bench to Chennai and await their return with the approval before numbering those cases and listing them for hearing before the judges holding the portfolio concerned.

They pointed out that the instructions contained in the circular had already been adhered to with respect to a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed recently with a plea to disqualify Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami, Minister for Forests Dindigul C. Srinivasan, School Education Minister K.A. Sengottaiyan, Cooperation Minister ‘Sellur’ K. Raju and Minister for Food and Civil Supplies R. Kamaraj for allegedly running the government at the instructions of convicted party leader V.K. Sasikala. “The entire case bundle related to that PIL petition filed by T. Analagan, son of former AIADMK MLA R. Thamarai Kani, was sent to Chennai in accordance with the circular and was numbered only after obtaining the CJ’s consent. However, when the case was listed before a Division Bench of Justices A. Selvam and N. Authinathan on Tuesday, they adjourned the hearing to April 11 for deciding its maintainability,” an official said.

He also pointed out that this was the first time that the High Court was insisting upon prior consent of the Chief Justice before entertaining cases in which Ministers, MPs and MLAs were parties. “The circular does not state that only cases filed against those Constitutional authorities require prior consent of the CJ. It states that all cases in which they were parties must be forwarded for approval. So we don’t know whether cases filed by those authorities as petitioners should also be sent for CJ’s approval,” he added.

Pointing out that the Appeal Examiners were well-trained in scrutinising the case papers before numbering them, another official said that the recent circular would only burden the Chief Justice with the additional work of going through the case bundles in which the Ministers, MPs and MLAs were parties.