Supreme Court rejects plea for SIT probe, says image of top court damaged

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday junked a petition seeking an SIT probe into the allegations of graft involving a retired Orissa High Court judge and observed that the whole controversy has damaged the image of the top judiciary and created doubts about its integrity.

"Unnecessary doubts about the integrity of the institution have been created," the bench of R.K. Agrawal, Justice Arun Mishra and Justice A.M. Khanwilkar observed, as it deprecated the petition by lawyer Kamini Jaiswal.

Observing that nobody, including the judges of the top court, were above law, Justice Mishra pronouncing the judgment also said `No` to contempt against the lawyers - Prashant Bhushan and Jaiswal - with a hope that "all will unitedly work for the welfare of the institution (top court)".

Regretting that unnecessary aspersions were cast without proper verification of the facts, the court took a dim view of the plea for recusal of Justice Khanwilkar from the bench on the grounds that he along with Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud were on the bench that had heard the matter relating to a Lucknow-based private medical college linked to the admission scam.