New Delhi, May 1: Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra will face some of the leaders who had moved impeachment motion against him at a meeting led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on May 2. The main aim of the conference organised by the Prime Minister is to plan celebrations on Mahatma Gandhi’s 150th birth anniversary.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad and Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar are expected to attend the meeting. However, CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury will not participate in the meeting. Yechury is part of the 114-member panel constituted by the culture ministry.

The panel which is formed to approve policies, programmes and guide the commemoration of Gandhi’s 150th birth anniversary, will hold its first meeting on Wednesday to also decide on the broad dates and programme for the celebration.

The meeting will see the CJI and opposition leaders coming face to face after the impeachment motion sought by the opposition leaders. Congress along with some of its alliance served a notice to Vice President Venkaiah Naidu for Misra’s removal a week ago. After consulting legal experts, Vice-President had rejected the impeachment motion against CJI Dipak Misra, because it lacked 'substantial merit'. Naidu refused to accept the proposal and remarked that the allegations have a “serious tendency” to undermine the independence of the judiciary.

Finance minister Arun Jaitley lashed out at the Opposition. Through his blog-post, he said that the notice was meant to plague the judiciary. Opposition leaders had a view that Naidu should have formed a panel to review the charges instead of rejecting the notice outright.

Yechury, who had first put forward the idea to move a motion for CJI’s removal will miss the meeting as he is attending the seminar in England marking the 200th birth anniversary of Karl Marx. He said that he would all the attend subsequent meetings. The panel also includes all state chief ministers, senior BJP ministers and scholars.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on May 01, 2018 12:05 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).