Statute Bench to solve conflict in Supreme Court

Statute Bench to solve conflict in Supreme Court

Context:

• Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra formed a five-judge Constitution Bench, to resolve the conflict between two three-judge Benches of the Supreme Court, which has again brought to the fore the simmering tensions within the court.

Tinkering with judicial discipline:

• Trouble started when Justice Kurian Joseph, one of the five senior-most judges, voiced his concern in open court about fellow judges “tinkering with judicial discipline” and how the judges should function as “one” rather than in disparate voices.

Judgment overruled:

•   Justice Kurian was reacting to a February 8 judgment of a Bench of Justices Arun Mishra, A.K. Goel and M.M. Shantanagoudar which had overruled a 2014 judgment of a co-ordinate Bench of the then Chief Justice, R.M. Lodha, and Justices Madan B. Lokur and Kurian.
•  Justice Kurian passed scathing remarks about how judicial discipline did not allow a three-judge Bench to overrule the decision of another three-judge Bench.
•  The day after Justice Kurian made these remarks, Justice Mishra and Justice Goel referred the land acquisition cases before their Benches to the Chief Justice.
• They asked the Chief Justice of India to decide on whether these matters should be heard by a larger Bench.
• The February 8 judgment delivered by Justice Mishra’s Bench was on compensation paid to landowners, mostly farmers, when their land was acquired.