Supreme Court takes suo motu cognisance of remarks of Karnataka HC judge

New Delhi [India], September 20 (ANI): The Supreme Court on Friday took suo motu cognisance of the media reports pertaining to certain comments made by a Karnataka High Court judge against a woman lawyer.

A five-judge bench of the Supreme Court asked the Karnataka High Court to submit the report in this regard. The top court also asked the Attorney General and Solicitor General to assist the court.

Two video clips of one of the judge the Karnataka High Court had surfaced on social media platforms. In one of the videos, he was heard making gender-insensitive comments against a woman lawyer. In another video, the judge allegedly referred to a Muslim-dominated locality in Bengaluru as “Pakistan.”

The Supreme Court has listed the matter on September 25 for further hearing and sought a report from the registrar general of the Karnataka High Court after seeking administrative directions from the Chief Justice of the concerned HC.

The top court further remarked that in the age of social media, the judiciary is closely watched, and judges have to act accordingly.

A five-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud has taken the suo motu cognisance on the issue and told Attorney General R Venkataramani that it may lay down some basic guidelines.

The five judge bench said that they have assembled because of the gratuitous comments made by a judge of the Karnataka High Court and the videos of which are now getting circulated.

The video clips of the judge have surfaced on the social media platform X, with several prominent advocates calling for suo moto action against him.

“We call upon the Chief Justice of India to take suo moto action against this judge and send him for gender sensitisation training,” Senior Advocate Indira Jaising wrote in a post while sharing the video clip.