Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal

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Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal
In office
November 1, 2005 – January 14, 2007
Nominated by none (per convention as he was the senior most judge)
Appointed by Abdul Kalam
Preceded by R.C. Lahoti
Succeeded by K.G. Balakrishnan
Born January 14, 1942 (1942-01-14) (age 66)

Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal (born on January 14, 1942) was the 36th Chief Justice of India.

He was sworn in as the Chief Justice by the President of India, A P J Abdul Kalam on November 1, 2005 for a period of about 14 months ending on January 14, 2007.

Five months after he retired, he was embroiled in allegations that his sons were involved in the real estate business in Delhi at a time when he was spearheading an intense drive to demolish a large number of illegal commercial buildings across Delhi. The matter came under intense public scrutiny after the Delhi High Court ordered the imprisonment of four journalists from Mid-Day for contempt of court, despite there being no evidence that what they had reported was incorrect[1]. Former Solicitor General KK Sud called this behaviour "the height of indiscretion."[2].

Contents

[edit] Career

Sabharwal worked as an advocate for Indian Railways from 1969 to 1981, as an advocate for Delhi administration from 1973 to 1976-1977, later as Additional Standing Counsel and then as Standing Counsel. He also served as Counsel to the Central Government from 1980 to 1986. He represented Delhi in the Bar Council of India from 1969 to 1973.

He became an Additional Judge in the Delhi High Court on November 17, 1986 and a judge soon after.

On February 3, 1999, he was appointed as Chief Justice of Bombay High Court. In less than a year, he was appointed as a judge, Supreme Court of India.

[edit] Significant judgements

As a judge of the Supreme Court, he delivered several important judgements dealing with constitutional matters.

  • A constitutional bench headed by Justice Sabharwal in October 2005 held as unconstitutional the dissolution of Bihar assembly on the basis of the report of Governor Buta Singh but refused to revert the action, thereby paving way for fresh elections.
  • He headed the bench which refused to grant any relief in the 2006 Delhi sealing drive in which thousands of illegal constructions were demolished across Delhi. This became controversial after it was later found that his two sons were connected with the real estate business in Delhi.
  • In 2007, he headed a nine judge constitution bench which ruled that all laws placed under the ninth schedule after April 24, 1973, shall be open to be challenged in court if they violate the fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 14, 19, 20 and 21 of the Constitution. This judgment was made in response to a number of petitions made on various laws including the Tamil Nadu Reservation Act, 1994.
Cover of Mid-Day (2007-06-26) showing an IT mall under construction by Pawan Impex, a firm promoted by Justice Sabharwal's sons. The Rs. 560 million, eight story mall in NOIDA is being built jointly with shopping mall giant BPTP. Before the partnership with BPTP, the share capital of Pawan Impex was Rs. 0.1 million.
Cover of Mid-Day (2007-06-26) showing an IT mall under construction by Pawan Impex, a firm promoted by Justice Sabharwal's sons. The Rs. 560 million, eight story mall in NOIDA is being built jointly with shopping mall giant BPTP. Before the partnership with BPTP, the share capital of Pawan Impex was Rs. 0.1 million.[3]

[edit] Allegations of Real Estate Operations by his sons

During the 2006 Delhi sealing drive, the Supreme Court under Sabharwal demonstrated extraordinary zeal in demolishing a slarge number of commercial properties which were illegally running in residential areas. There were very extensive protests every day, and considerable political pressure, due to which demolitions would often be hindered. The court monitored events and regularly reprimanded the Municipal Corporation of Delhi for its tardy progress. As a consequence of the extensive bulldozing of buildings, legal commercial properties, as in the new shopping malls, rose dramatically in price[4]. Particularly, luxury store owners and other upscale businesses were very keen to get into the limited mall floor space.

In May 2007, five months after Sabharwal retired from the bench, the afternoon newspaper Mid-Day brought out a series of articles that presented documents showing that YK Sabharwal's sons, Chetan and Nitin Sabharwal, owned at least four small ventures, most of them oriented towards garment exports, but one in the construction arena. During Sabharwal's tenure as Chief justice, two of these firms suddenly attracted the interest of the very largest players in the shopping mall industry.

The first firm, Pawan Impex, Pvt Ltd, was registered for some time at Justice Sabharwal's official bungalow in the heart of Delhi, and later at his private house. Having the firm registered at his government-furnished house may have been illegal[5]. In a newspaper editorial on Sept 2, 2007, Justice Sabharwal has said that he asked his sons to shift the registered address as soon as he found out about it[6], but in an interview recorded by Mid-Day in April 2007, after the shift, he claims complete ignorance about the matter[5].

More damaging is the fact that Pawan Impex, which had remained with a capitalization of 0.1 million Rs. since its founding in 2002, suddenly attracted the interest of Kabul and Anjali Chawla, owners of the large and rapidly growing real estate firm Business Park Town Planners (BPTP)[7] which had promoted large malls like Park Centra (Gurgaon), Next Door (Faridabad), and the Parklands Shop-In Park (North Delhi). In June 2006, at the peak of the Supreme Court interest in the 2006 Delhi sealing drive, the Chawla's invested in Park Impex, raising the Share Capital 300 fold to Rs. 30 million, with equal shares between the original promoters and the Chawlas[8][9]. Two months later, in August, the company obtained a loan of Rs. 280 million by a bank which happens to be a tenant of a BPTP property. These allegations appear to be well documented in a set of papers released by the Campaign for Judicial Accountability[10] and were not addressed in Justice Sabharwal's public response[6], though he did mention that his sons were creating an IT Mall. After the partnership with BPTP in June 2007 Pawan Impex purchased four acres of land in NOIDA on which this IT Mall is being constructed; Mid-Day reports it to be a Rs. 560 million project with 300,000 sq ft (28,000 m²). saleable floor area[3].

A second firm, Harpawan Constructors, equally unknown, had also been promoted by the brothers. In October 2005, the promoters of Filatex India, a polyester yarn firm with a turnover of Rs. 3 billion in FY 2007, Purshottam and Madhu Sudan Bhageria, also the owners of real estate firm Fargo Estates, invested in Harpawan. Subsequently, the Bhagerias announced plans for developing the Square One, a mall devoted to luxury brands in Delhi. Justice Sabharwal has said that Purshottam Bhageria was his son's childhood friend, and that Harparwan Construction, despite its name, has not made any real estate or other investments[6].

The business of Chetan and Nitin expanded dramatically after 2005. Besides setting up several garment manufacturing factories, they have embarked on a massive real estate programme in NOIDA.

Possibly the largest project for Pawan Impex is the Rs. 560 million IT Mall being constructed in Noida. In the application to construct this mall, they had given the turnover and business of their company as "Nil". Their application for constructing this mall was approved rather mysteriously, given that in the application they had declared their company to be "Nil turnover" and "Nil business"[5]. An earlier applicant, Softedge Solutions, had been rejected on the ground that they could not satisfactorily answer questions about their previous experience in IT and their technical tie up. But Pawan Impex represented by Chetan Sabharwal with Nil business, no previous track record in IT and no technical tie up, managed to obtain permission. [5]

[edit] Conflict of Interest charges

Whatever the facts of the case, it is widely felt that Justice Sabharwal's being active in such decisions when his sons were even partly involved in the Delhi real estate business lacked propriety, and that he should have recused himself from these cases. To the contrary, the Outlook (magazine) printed a report claiming that [5]. Vitusha Oberoi, an editor at Mid-day, said: "We have said that what we have said is the truth (in their articles relating to former Chief Justice of India Y K Sabharwal) and that is why we should not be hauled up for contempt." However, the contempt laws in India do not rely on truth as the primary test for judging contempt. The columns were also somewhat tongue-in-cheek, accompanied also by a cartoon (the cartoonist has also been sentenced to four months in jail).

Justice R S Sodhi and Justice B N Chaturvedi of the Delhi High Court, in their judgement, said: "We feel, in this peculiar case, the contemnors have tarnished the image of the highest court and the sentence of four months' imprisonment would serve the justice."[11]. "The Supreme Court in its judgement has clearly laid down the Laxman Rekha which we feel the publications have crossed." (The Laxman Rekha is a Ramayanic reference to a line that should not be crossed). However the defendants had already processed their bail requests from the Supreme Court, and they were immediately released on bail.

About the judgement, ex-law minister Shanti Bhushan stated that Parliament had in 2006 amended the Contempt of Courts Act to say that "if the allegations against a judge were found to be true, then they would not be considered contemptuous". In view of this, the judgement, he said, may be "only aimed at terrifying the media and an attempt to curb truthfulness."[1]

In any event, the decision of four months imprisonment for the reporters, without establishing the falsity of the reportage, has only brought the matter into far more intense public scrutiny.

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Shock, anger at Sabharwal's mall-aa-mall", Mid-Day, June 12, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-22. 
  2. ^ a b Vitusha Oberoi and M.K. Tayal, Sabharwal's shop talk, Mid Day, June 26, 2007.
  3. ^ IANS. "Sealing, demolitions push up mall prices", Thursday August 31. Retrieved on 2007-09-22. 
  4. ^ a b c d e Prashant Bhushan. "Contempt Of Judicial Power", Outlook (magazine), Sep 19, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-23. This is a rebuttal of Justice Sabharwal's column in the Times of India defending the actions by his sons.
  5. ^ a b c Justice Y.K. Sabharwal. "A former Chief Justice of India defends his honour", Times of India Delhi, Sep 2, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-23. 
  6. ^ http://www.bptp.com/
  7. ^ "Lift kara de...", Mid-Day, June 12, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-22. 
  8. ^ Affidavit filed by Vitusha Oberoi in Delhi High Court. judicialreforms.org (July 2007). Retrieved on 2007-09-22.
  9. ^ Judge Watch on Justice Y.K.Sabharwal: Supporting documents. Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms. Retrieved on 2007-09-22.
  10. ^ "4 journos get jail term for scandalising ex-CJI", CNN-IBN, September 21, 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-23. 

[edit] External links

Preceded by
R.C. Lahoti		 Chief Justice of India
November 1, 2005– January 14, 2007		 Succeeded by
K. G. Balakrishnan
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