Kolkata HC judge Karnan might have fled to Bangladesh or Nepal to evade arrest: Media

As police is in search of Kolkata High Court's Justice CS Karnan, who was sentenced to six-month imprisonment for contempt of court by the Supreme Court on Tuesday, W Peter Ramesh Kumar, his close aide and legal adviser, claimed that the judge is evading arrest and may have left the country.

PK Balachandran, Sri Lanka Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 11 May 2017, 06:24 AM
Updated : 11 May 2017, 06:45 AM

He will return to the country only if the President of India gives him an appointment, Kumar said, according to Indian Express.

Although media and Chennai police were told that Justice Karnan had left the Chepauk government guest house on Wednesday morning to visit Kalahasti (a temple town that lies approximately 130 km north of Chennai, in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh), only his cellphone had travelled to Kalahasti while he took a direction towards north, Kumar said.

While Kumar claimed that Justice Karnan might have crossed Indian borders to “Nepal or Bangladesh”, he refused to elaborate on the route and details, especially as a road route from Chennai to any Indian border will take a minimum journey of 36 hours.

“Justice Karnan will not surrender until he gets justice. Only the operative part of SC order is available now. Unless he gets an elaborate copy of the SC order, he will not be able to analyze the judgment. It was the President who appointed him and there are protocols for both of them to meet as an employer and employee.”

“Moreover, his petition against 20 senior SC judges and their corruption charges is still lying before the President and Prime Minister Narendra Modi .When he was sentenced to prison, what happened to that petition and charges he raised against SC judges? His petition is not yet rejected.”

“Justice Karnan will file a review petition in the Supreme Court after he gets a clear picture. He demands that the union government file an appeal for him as he was sentenced by the Supreme Court without a trial,” Kumar said.

Kumar was also sentenced to six months simple imprisonment, disqualification from his lawyer job and a fine of Rs 2,000 for barging into a court chamber and disrupting court proceedings by the Madras High Court in February 2016.

The Indian Supreme Court on Tuesday held Calcutta High Court Judge CS Karnan guilty of contempt of court, judiciary and judicial process and sentenced him to six months imprisonment.

Justice Karnan was to be taken into custody forthwith.

“We are of the unanimous opinion that Justice CS Karnan has committed contempt of court, judiciary and judicial process of the gravest nature,” Chief Justice JS Khehar said in the order.

The court also ordered media not to publish the content of orders passed by Justice Karnan, who on Monday issued an order sentencing eight Supreme Court judges to five years of “rigorous imprisonment” and imposed a fine of Rs 100,000 each under the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989 and the amended Act of 2015.

The eight include members of the seven-judge Bench, headed by Justice Khehar which, in February, issued a contempt order against him on the charge of degrading the judiciary.

Justice Karnan, on his part, directed the Supreme Court judges “to appear before him on May 28” and later “reposted” the matter to May 1.

The Supreme Court Bench ordered Justice Karnan to be medically examined and on May 4, but he refused to undergo medical tests. He told the team of doctors, in a written response, that he is “absolutely normal and with a stable mind.”