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The Supreme Court on Wednesday spoke against the Madhya Pradesh High Court’s criteria behind sacking a woman judge, and said her predicament due to a miscarriage was not taken into consideration. Censuring the High Court order, the Supreme Court remarked, “I wish men have menstruation. Then they will know what it is”.
The Supreme Court bench, led by Justices B V Nagarathna and N Kotiswar Singh also sought clarification from the high court on the criteria for the termination of civil judges.
“I hope such criteria are also imposed on male judges. I have no hesitation in saying this. The lady, she has got pregnant and she had a miscarriage. The mental and physical trauma of a lady who has undergone a miscarriage. What is this? I wish men have menstruation. Then they will know what it is,” Justice Nagarathna was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.
The termination order against judge Aditi Kumar Sharma was passed in June 2023. The report submitted by the Madhya Pradesh High Court said that her performance dropped from “very good” and “good” ratings during 2019-20 to “average” and “poor” in the subsequent years.
However, the Supreme Court said that the judge’s assessment ignored the mental and physical trauma endured by her due to the miscarriage.
On November 11, 2023, the top court took cognisance of the termination of six women civil judges by the state government over their alleged unsatisfactory performance.
However, a full court of the MP high court reconsidered its earlier resolutions on August 1, and decided to reinstate four officers, namely, Jyoti Varkade, Sushri Sonakshi Joshi, Sushri Priya Sharma and Rachna Atulkar Joshi on certain terms and conditions leaving out the other two Aditi Kumar Sharma and Sarita Chaudhary from the exercise.
The top court was considering the cases of the judges who joined the Madhya Pradesh judicial service in 2018 and 2017, respectively.
In 2022, the judge Aditi Kumar Sharma had about 1,500 pending cases with a disposal rate below 200, it was stated in a report submitted by the High Court.
On being asked about the reasons for a sharp decline in performance, the judge informed the high court that she suffered a miscarriage in 2021, followed by her brother’s cancer diagnosis.
While taking cognisance of the termination, the two-judge bench of the Supreme Court issued notices to the high court registry and the judicial officers who had not approached it against the termination.
The judges were terminated, although a quantitative assessment of their work could not be done on account of the Covid outbreak, the top court noted.
“The officers along with three other women officers were appointed in judicial services in the state of Madhya Pradesh. They are alleged to be terminated from service primarily on account of disposal not being up to the standards set,” the high court registry stated, as per the news agency PTI.
The termination orders were passed in June 2023 by the state law department after an administrative committee and a full court meeting found their performance during the probation period “unsatisfactory”, the top court was told.
A plea by one of the judges, filed by advocate Charu Mathur, argued that despite a four-year unblemished service record and no adverse remarks, she was terminated without following any due process of law.
She alleged her termination from service was a violation of her fundamental rights under Articles 14 (right to equality before law) and 21 (right to life and personal liberty) of the Constitution.
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