BAGLUNG, June 1: Acting Chief Justice Damodar Prasad Sharma said on Friday that he would tender resignation should Chairman of the Interim Election Council Khil Raj Regmi return to the Supreme Court as the chief justice.
Inaugurating the 40th National Executive Council of Nepal Bar Association (NBA) in Baglung, Acting Chief Justice Sharma also asked all not to tarnish the image of the country’s apex court under one pretext or the other. “No one should act in contempt of the court by unnecessarily linking the independent judiciary with Khil Raj [Regmi],” he said. “I will stop working if Regmi returns to the court; I will tender resignation from my post.”[break]
Sharma asked the NBA to pass that proposal through the executive council of the NBA. He also clarified that Regmi did not decide to assume the post of chairman of the Interim Election Council through the decision of the Supreme Court.
“It is politics that rules the country. We don’t know why the parties asked him to head the government and why he accepted,” he said, adding that the Supreme Court did not decide to send him to head the election government.
Sharma also clarified that though he was working in the capacity of acting chief justice he is in effect the sitting chief justice. “I am the chief justice even if no one has said so in so many words. I am authorized to accomplish the tasks,” he said.
As former NBA presidents and senior advocates had said in the council meeting that Supreme Court had fallen under the shadow of Chairman Regmi and the justice delivery in the country was badly affected after Chief Justice Regmi’s appointment as head of the government, Sharma had challenged the NBA to prove if SC verdicts were influenced by Regmi. “Don’t call the court’s works into question,” he said.
Sharma also assured that he would work in close cooperation with the NBA.
Supreme Court eclipsed: Ex Bar chiefs
Lawyers have claimed that the Supreme Court has been eclipsed ever since Chief Justice Khil Raj Regmi became chairman of the interim election government.
The lawyers, who have been demanding Regmi’s resignation as CJ, intensified the campaign at the Bar’s National Executive Council meeting underway here in Baglung as well.
NBA General Secretary Sunil Pokharel said that the participants of the national gathering have strongly raised the issue. “No one can violate the system of rule of law,” said Pokharel. “We demanded Regmi’s resignation as he blatantly violated the constitution.”
Former NBA Chairman Prem Bahadur Khadka claimed that “black cloud has been hovering over the apex court ever since Regmi headed the government.”
He also said Regmi will not be allowed to enter the apex court if he wanted to return to the court as chief justice.
“He [Regmi] left the court as he didn’t believe in constitutional supremacy,” said Khadka. “He has no place at the Supreme Court after he became the executive head.”
Former NBA Chairman Shambhu Thapa claimed that Regmi has automatically been relieved from the head of judiciary after he assumed the post of head of government.
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