For judge at centre of storm, it’s work as usual

NAINITAL: A day after the Centre returned the SC collegium proposal on elevation of Uttarakhand high court chief justice (CJ) K M Joseph to the apex court, the judge at the centre of the ‘judicial storm’ chose not to react to the debate, instead preferring to quietly go about his work.

He arrived in the Nainital HC at his usual time of 9.15 am, greeted staff members and fellow judges and then proceeded to hear the cases listed in his court. He curtailed his lunch time to 15 minutes from 45 minutes preferring to instead spend the time in closing the hearing of a case and left the court on the dot at his scheduled time of leaving, 4.30 pm.

Attempts by media personnel to elicit a reaction from him on the ongoing debate were turned down by his office. One of his staff members told TOI, “The CJ doesn’t wish to comment on the matter either privately or publicly.”

During the course of the day, Joseph presided over the hearings of 57 cases, which were heard by a division bench (of which he was a part along with Justice Sharad Sharma). The bench mainly heard cases pertaining to civil and service matters as well as a few public interest litigations. Among the notable cases that came up were an ongoing matter regarding the monkey menace in Bageshwar in Kumaon as well as the issue of diploma holders’ appointment in government primary schools.

Those who attended the hearings said the CJ was his usual self with nothing in his demeanor to indicate anything amiss.