New Delhi, April 23: The Shiv Sena Member of Parliament (MP) from Mumbai constituency Arvind Sawant on Monday slammed Vice President and Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu, for rejecting the Impeachment motion. Sawant while speaking to media said, both the parties(Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party) are playing dirty politics & the way the impeachment motion was rejected is also political. He added that there was no need to reject the impeachment motion in haste. The Congress led opposition parties on April 20, 2018 signed an impeachment motion comprising 71 Members of Parliament(MP) of Rajya Sabha to seek removal of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Mishra on grounds of misbehaviour or incapacity. However, now Congress is going to challenge the rejection in the Supreme Court (SC).
Naidu over the impeachment stated, "In the absence of 'credible and verifiable information', which gives an information of misbehaviour or incapacity, it would be an 'inappropriate and irresponsible act' to accept statements which have little empirical basis. Hence, the impeachment has been rejected." Before taking the decision, Naidu consulted several constitutional experts and thereafter announced his decision. Among those whom he consulted were current Attorney General KK Venugopal, former SC judge B Sudarshan Reddy, former AG and Rajya Sabha MP K Parasaran and former Rajya Sabha Secretary General VK Agnihotri.
Further defending his decision Naidu remarked, "I have applied my mind to all five charges made out in impeachment motion and examined all annexed documents. All facts as stated in motion don't make out a case which can lead any reasonable mind to conclude that CJI on these facts can be ever held guilty of misbehaviour.”
After the Vice-President rejected the removal motion against the CJI, all judges of the Supreme Court, including CJI Dipak Misra were 15 minutes late to court today, amid speculation that they met briefly to discuss the impeachment move.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Apr 23, 2018 01:47 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).