SC dismisses petition for SIT probe; spares contempt action

New Delhi, November 14 : The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition filed by advocate Kamini Jaiswal seeking setting up of a special investigation team (SIT) under the supervision of a retired Chief Justice of India to probe allegations of bribery to procure judicial orders in a medical college admissions case.
A three-judge Bench of Justices RK Agrawal, Arun Mishra and AM Khanwilkar said acts of advocates Kamini Jaiswal and Prashant Bhushan and senior advocate Dushyant Dave were contemputous but chose not to initiate contempt proceedings against them.
The Bench also indicted them for forum shopping as they knew that a petition was pending before a Bench headed by Justice AK Sikri and still filed a second similar petition and mentioned it before Justice J Chelameswar’s Bench. The order passed by Justice Chelameswar’s Bench to refer the petition to five top judges had created a storm and the CJI set up a Five-Judge Constitution Bench headed by him that asserted his authority as “the master of the roster” and effectively overturned the order passed by Justice Chelameswar’s Bench. It said because of unverified and unsubstantiated charges levelled by senior advocates, doubt was cast on this great institution, that is, the Supreme Court.