Shanti Bhushan Ji will be Remembered for His Contribution to Legal Field: PM Modi

GG News Bureau

New Delhi, 1st Feb. Prime Minister Narendra Modi condoled the death of former law minister Shanti Bhushan on Tuesday, saying the veteran lawyer will be remembered for his contributions to the legal field.

“Shri Shanti Bhushan Ji will be remembered for his contribution to the legal field and passion towards speaking for the underprivileged. Pained by his passing away. Condolences to his family. Om Shanti,” PM Modi tweeted.

Bhushan died on Tuesday, aged 97, after a short illness.

He had also taken part in the agitation led by social activist Anna Hazare.

Bhushan was one of the Aam Aadmi Party’s founding members. However, he had a falling out with AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal within two years of the party’s formation.

In 2018, he petitioned the Supreme Court to challenge the chief justice of India’s roster practice of allocating cases in the top court.

In his petition, Bhushan sought to limit the powers of the CJI, who is the “master of the roster” and assigns cases to different courts for hearing.

“The petition raises a very fundamental issue going to the root of the functioning of the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India and as such is very critical to the interpretation of the Constitution of India and the Rule of Law in India,” stated Bhushan in his petition.

“The Chief Justice of India could not have heard this case himself quite apart from exercising his power as master of roster in allocating a bench to hear this case and constituting a Constitution Bench that finally pronounced the order declaring the Chief Justice of India as master of roster. The principle of master of roster cannot be applicable to a case where the Chief Justice of India is himself involved,” Bhushan added.

From 1977 to 1979, Bhushan was the law minister in the Morarji Desai-led Janata Party government, which came to power following the Emergency.