Recusal A Matter Of Judges' Discretion, Article 142 Cannot Be Used To Frame Guidelines On Judicial Recusal: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Friday (May 16) dismissed a writ petition seeking guidelines to govern the recusal of judges.

A bench of Justice Abhay S Oka and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan held, “The recusal is a matter of discretion of the judge. Jurisdiction under Article 142 cannot be exercised for laying down guidelines for the recusal of judges. Hence the writ petition is dismissed.”.

Last year, the court refused to entertain a similar plea by the same petitioner objecting to aspersions caste against a Karnataka High Court judge who recused from the petitioner's plea after reserving order. That plea sought inquiry into recusal of the judge.

The petitioner again approached the Supreme Court in the present petition, pursuant to liberty granted by the court earlier to file a fresh petition restricted to seeking guidelines on recusal of judges.

During the hearing, Justice Oka asked, “How can we frame such guidelines? This is the discretion of the judge.”

Advocate Nisha Tiwari, appearing for the petitioner responded that she had cited reasons and referred to practices followed in other countries where judges are obligated to inform parties of any conflict of interest in advance. She also referred to principles adopted by the Supreme Court that “unnecessary recusal should not be taken.”

She further submitted, “In my case the judge has recused, no bench has been assigned just because such guidelines are not there. Reserved the judgment, kept for pronouncement on four different occasions and on the 5th occasion he recused.”

Justice Oka reiterated, “We cannot frame such guidelines.”

The Court also recorded the grievance of the petitioner that a bench of the Karnataka High Court had recused from hearing their case and no fresh bench had been assigned.

The court stated, “We permit the petitioners to move the Chief Justice of the High Court on the administrative side. We are sure that if such an application is made the Chief Justice will assign a bench.”

When Tiwari informed the Court that the application had already been filed but no action had been taken, Justice Oka said, “Now we have passed an order that you apply on the administrative side and the Chief Justice will assign.”

Background

The original petition before the High Court sought registration of an FIR against the wife and son of the Karnataka Lokayukta and a probe into alleged corruption in the judiciary.

In the earlier petition dismissed by the Supreme Court on October 24, 2023, court had refused to entertain the plea seeking an inquiry into the recusal of Justice M Nagaprasanna of the Karnataka High Court after reserving order in the case.

On that day, the petitioner had maintained that there was no intention to cast aspersions on the judge. The Supreme Court, however, had objected to the content of the petition, observing that the petition cast aspersions on the judge and contained objectionable and irrelevant averments.

However, the Court had allowed the petitioner to withdraw that petition with liberty to file a fresh one limited to the issue of whether guidelines on recusal could be laid down. The bench made it clear that it was not making any adjudication on the appropriateness of framing such guidelines.

Case no. – Diary No. 26250 / 2025

Case Title – Chandraprabha v. Union of India

Citation : 2025 LiveLaw (SC) 648

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