A nine-judge Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant on Tuesday remarked that the 2006 public interest litigation (PIL) that led to the quashing of the Sabarimala Ayyappa Temple's custom restricting women aged 10 to 50 from entering should have been outrightly thrown in the dustbin.
Background of the PIL
The PIL was filed by the All India Young Lawyers Association through its president Naushad Ali in 2006. Senior advocate RP Gupta, representing the association, narrated how a misconduct by the thantri (chief priest) of the Ayyappa temple led to the filing of the petition challenging the age-old restriction. The bench, led by CJI Kant, said the Supreme Court at best could have ordered investigations into the misconduct to bring the guilty to book. However, based on newspaper reports alone, the PIL could not have been entertained, the bench asserted.
Court's Observations
The bench stated, The Supreme Court entertained the PIL based on such documents, which should have been thrown in the dustbin. Locus standi was generated based on newspaper reports. The court should have ensured that action against the offender is expedited and nothing more. The nine-judge bench comprised CJI Kant, Justices B V Nagarathna, M M Sundresh, Ahsanuddin Amanullah, Aravind Kumar, Augustine G Masih, Prasanna B Varale, R Mahadevan, and Joymalya Bagchi.
Justice Aravind Kumar questioned whether the lawyers body had passed a resolution for filing the PIL and whether it was a registered body. Gupta responded that there was no resolution and that Naushad Ali was merely a name-lender, yet threats were issued to him and his counsel. He further informed that then Chief Justice Dipak Misra, who was the architect of the controversial judgment, had offered security to the petitioner and its counsel. Then CJI Misra had said that even if the petitioner wanted to withdraw the PIL, the court would not allow it, Gupta added.
De Facto Suo Motu Petition
CJI Kant observed, So it was de facto a suo motu petition (taken up on its own by the court) de jure filed by the petitioner organisation? The suggestion that the matter had been engineered by the bench led by then CJI Misra found some confirmation in Justice Nagarathna's remark: This is a realistic assessment of the CJI (Kant).
Justice Nagarathna said, The former CJI offered security to you and the petitioner organisation president. He could have ensured no security threat to you by not entertaining the petition. Why would a non-believer in Ayyappa question the temple customs carried on for decades based on faith and belief of devotees? Are you the chief priest of the country to question temple customs and say how can there be such a custom in Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala? Justice Sundresh added that it appears to be a clear case of abuse of process of law.
Current Stance on PILs
Justice Nagarathna noted that the Supreme Court now entertains genuine PILs and is strongly against private-publicity-paisa-political interest litigations. The bench's remarks underscore the need for stricter scrutiny of PILs to prevent misuse of the judicial process.
