Supreme Court Stays MP High Court Order For Vigilance Enquiry Into Trial Judge's Work Of 5 Years

The Supreme Court recently stayed the order of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, which made adverse remarks against a  POCSO Special Judge, calling his conduct 'intellectual dishonesty' and directing an enquiry into 5 years of his judicial work. 

The bench of CJI BR Gavai and Justice K Vinod Chandran was hearing a challenge against the adverse remarks of the Madhya Pradesh High Court against a judicial officer in a criminal case. 

While issuing notice in the matter, the bench proceeded to stay the directions for investigation against the judicial officer/ petitioner by the High Court. 

"The impugned judgment and order of the High Court insofar as the directions issued against the petitioner, shall stand stayed, until further orders."

The petitioner, namely Vivek Singh Raghuvanshi, is a Special Judge, POCSO at Umaria district in Madhya Pradesh who had convicted a person for offence of raping a minor under Sections 363, 366, 344, 376-D, 376(2)(m), 506 IPC and Section 6 of the POCSO Act.

In doing so, he relied upon the Scholar Register as primary proof of age of the victim. This was also supported by other testimonial evidence and the prosecutrix's statement. 

The accused then appealed the conviction to the High Court. While the High Court set aside the conviction, it also made adverse remarks against the petitioner. The bench termed the petitioner's conduct as “intellectual dishonesty” and ordered a vigilance enquiry by Registrar (Vigilance)into his judicial work of the last five years.

The High Court relied upon the ossification test report, duly supported with a formal x-ray film to conclude that the victim was not a minor at the time of the incident, thus holding that the POCSO Act will not be applicable in the present case. The High Court also noted that the victim was in a live-in relationship with the accused for 6 months. 

The High Court's remarks towards the petitioners were : 

"In view of the ossification report available on record, it is most unfortunate that the trial Court for the reasons to be explained by it, despite availability of the x-ray film and the report, did not deem it proper either to pose questions to the accused under Section 313 and also did not deem it proper to mark exhibit. In our opinion, this is height of intellectual dishonesty and negligence on the part of the Presiding Officer. This kind of negligence cannot be said to be originating from any kind of subordination to the High Court, but is a patent dishonesty and negligence apparent on record." 

The petitioner contends that (1)  the scholar register is a legally admissible evidence; (2) neither the prosecution nor the defence relied upon the X-ray and ossification report; (3) the High Court itself made the following observations : 

a.The X-ray findings suggested age between 16–18 years on the basis of joint formation; b.The dental examination suggested age between 18–20 years; c. The incident itself had occurred nearly six months prior to the medical examination. 

Counsels for the petitioner : Mr. Sanjay R Hegde, Sr. Adv.; Mr. Prathvi Raj Chauhan, AOR; Mr. Hanumant Singh, Adv.; Mr. Tejendra Singh, Adv.; Mr. Sachin Singh, Adv.; Mr. Ankit Tiwari, Adv.

Case Details : VIVEK SINGH RAGHUVANSHI v. THE STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH| SPECIAL LEAVE PETITION (CRIMINAL) Diary No(s). 51903/2025

Click here to read the order