Slander campaign on HC judge: Bengal in legal crisis

One-liner: Though not many yet there had been an instance during the previous Left Front govt in West Bengal where an important leader of the ruling party got engaged in a spat with a judge of Calcutta HC.

Ban rallies on working days: In 2003, the late Justice Amitava Lala of Calcutta HC made an observation within the court that rallies on the streets of Kolkata should be banned on working days. His observation was prompted by a development where his vehicle destined for the court got stuck on the roads because of a rally of the ruling party.

Slogan against judge: The spat started there only as irked by Justice Lala's observation, veteran CPI(M) leader and the Left Front chairman Biman Bose in a public meeting raised the slogan Bicharpoti Lala, Bangla Chhere Pala (Justice Lala, you better flee from Bengal).

Apology tendered: As controversies started flowing in from different sections of the society, both Bose and party leadership decided to take a step ahead in bringing an end to the snowballing hullabaloo. Soon Bose personally visited the court of Justice Lala and apologised for coining such a slogan.

Brainchild of Jyoti Basu  It is perceived by many Left Front veterans that the approach of ending the controversy through the tendering of apology was the brainchild of nonagenarian Indian Marxists and longest-serving West Bengal CM, the late Jyoti Basu.

Crossed all limits: However, this time throughout the entire past week, the slanderous moves concerning Justice Rajasekhar Mantha of Calcutta HC have crossed all limits where not a verdict but a particular representative of the judiciary has become the target of the nastiest-ever political attack both within the HC premises as well as outside.

Slanderous posters: The fiasco started from Jan 9 morning after slanderous posters were seen pasted on the walls of Justice Mantha's residence and adjacent areas where the latter was slammed for being biased towards the leader of the opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari.

Slammed for recent verdict: In the posters, he was also slammed for his recent verdict removing the protection of shield against any cohesive action, including arrest, by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) against Maneka Gambhir, sister-in-law of Trinamool Congress's national general secretary and party Lok Sabha member, Abhishek Banerjee.

Boycott of court: On the same day a section of the lawyers of the Calcutta HC started boycotting Justice Mantha's bench and also started resisting their fellow professionals in entering his court. 

Contempt of court rule: The fiasco continued on Monday and Tuesday until on Wednesday morning Justice Mantha issued a contempt of court rule and also filed a suo motu (on one's own) petition in the matter.

• Although the resistance from entering his court stopped, a large section of the public prosecutors and govt pleaders continued boycotting his bench thus affecting the progress of the cases where the state govt is a party

Political slugfest: The political slugfest is at full rhythm over the development, even as the Trinamool Congress leadership has denied the party's association with the development while maintaining that certain verdicts and decisions of Justice Mantha are bound to create negative repercussions. 

CM's silence questioned: The opposition parties like the BJP and CPI(M) have questioned the absolute silence of the CM in the matter.

Political party not satisfied: There the legal brains of the state have started raising the question on how a Judge of the Calcutta HC can become the target of such vicious slanders just because a particular political party is not satisfied with certain judgments and observations of that representative of the judiciary.

Dissatisfaction: Both Calcutta HC Chief Justice Prakash Srivastava as well as Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay have expressed thorough dissatisfaction over the development.