CV Nagarjuna Reddy

In a extraordinary development, as many as 61 members in Rajya Sabha has submitted a petition to Rajya Sabha chairman Hamid Ansari seeking impeachment process against High Court of Andhra Pradesh judge Justice C V Nagarjuna Reddy. They alleged him of victimising a dalit district court judge and amassing assets disproportionate to his income.

All the signatures of the notice are opposition members. They include Sitaram Yechuri (CPM), D Raja (CPI), Digvijay Singh, Oscar Fernandes (Congress), Sharad Yadav (JD-U) and Naresh Agarwal (Samajwadi party). But none of the member from ruling NDA signed on the petition.

According to the notice, the junior civil judge, S Rama Krishna, was allegedly assaulted and called names by Reddy and his brother, Pawan Kumar Reddy, when he refused to remove the name of Reddy’s brother from a dying declaration. The dying declaration of a servant employed with Reddy’s brother was recorded by Krishna in 2012, in which the victim accused Reddy’s brother of setting him on fire “for not agreeing to sign on a blank paper.”

MPs alleged that the Dalit judge was victimised after the dying declaration was recorded. It says he was first transferred from Rayachoty before completion of his stipulated tenure, and thereafter placed under suspension based on an anonymous complaint regarding corruption allegations against him.

They also accused that the Judge possesses wealth disproportionate to his known sources of income and did not declare his assets to the Chief Justice and to the public in violation of the full court resolution of 1997.