The Supreme Court on Wednesday orally observed that there was prima facie no bar on the Lok Sabha setting up an inquiry committee to look into corruption charges against Allahabad High Court Justice Yashwant Varma after a similar motion was rejected in the Rajya Sabha, PTI reported.

A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and SC Sharma, however, said that it will examine if the question was so prejudicial to Varma’s interests as to warrant the intervention of the court, The Indian Express reported.

The court was hearing a petition filed by Varma challenging the legality of the three-member judicial committee constituted by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla under the 1968 Judges Inquiry Act to investigate the impeachment proceedings against him in the unaccounted cash row.

The Allahabad High Court judge had sought to quash Birla’s decision to constitute the committee. He had argued that although the notices for his impeachment had been submitted both in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, Birla formed the committee unilaterally without waiting for the admission of the motion by the Upper House chairperson.

Unaccounted cash was allegedly recovered at Varma’s official residence in Delhi when emergency services responded to a fire there on March 14. He was a judge at the Delhi High Court at that time. The judge said he was in Bhopal when the cash was discovered and claimed that it did not belong to him or his family.

Amid the row, he was transferred to the Allahabad High Court.

A report of the in-house inquiry committee into the matter, released on May 3, concluded that there was “sufficient substance” in the charges against Varma. It held that the judge’s misconduct was “serious enough to call for initiation of proceedings for removal”.

To impeach a judge in Parliament, a removal motion is required to be signed by 100 Lok Sabha MPs or 50 Rajya Sabha MPs. If the motion is admitted in both Houses, a three-member judicial committee investigates the matter. The Parliament votes on the impeachment if the committee finds misconduct. If the motion gets two-thirds of the votes, the president is advised to remove the judge.

On July 25, Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said that the decision to impeach Varma was unanimous and that 152 MPs from the ruling coalition and the Opposition parties had signed the motion.

There is consensus that the removal of Varma should be a joint effort, he had said, adding that the Lok Sabha will take up the proceedings before they move to the Rajya Sabha in line with the Judges Inquiry Act.

However, on August 12, the Lok Sabha speaker formed a three-member committee, comprising Supreme Court Justice Aravind Kumar, Madras High Court Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and advocate B Vasudeva Acharya, to look into the matter.

In November, the committee sought a written statement from Varma on the charges against him. In response, the judge sought authenticated copies of the motions before both the Houses in July and any orders passed consequent to them.

However, the Lok Sabha’s secretary general said that the Rajya Sabha had not admitted the impeachment motion, Bar and Bench reported.

During the hearing on Wednesday, advocate Mukul Rohatgi, representing Varma, said that there were procedural irregularities that vitiated the inquiry proceedings set in motion against the judge by the Lok Sabha speaker.

He added that the “proviso says when notices are given on the same day [in both Houses of Parliament], no committee shall be constituted unless motion is admitted in both the Houses and the speaker forms a joint committee”.

However, an affidavit from the Lok Sabha secretary general in the matter stated that the deputy chairperson of the Rajya Sabha had rejected the motion on August 11, the advocate added.

“On July 21, the motion was moved,” Bar and Bench quoted Rohatgi as saying. “Chairman resigned in the evening that day. On August 11, the motion was rejected by the deputy chairman.”

The advocate was referring to the resignation of Jagdeep Dhankhar as vice president and the Rajya Sabha chairperson on July 21.

In response, the court asked whether any law prevented the Lok Sabha speaker from setting up an investigation committee after the Rajya Sabha chairperson rejected an impeachment motion when such motions are raised in both Houses.

It noted that a joint committee is contemplated only if both Houses admit the impeachment motion, Bar and Bench reported. However, Datta asked what would happen if one motion fails and one succeeds.

“If both Houses admit [the motion], then there is a joint committee,” Bar and Bench quoted the judge as saying. “But if one rejects it, then where is the bar for Lok Sabha to appoint [a probe committee]? If one motion is not accepted, why should the motion of the other House fail?”

Datta also observed that a purposive interpretation of the law was required.

The judge noted that he did not prima facie agree with Rohatgi’s argument that an impeachment motion in the Lok Sabha must fail if a similar motion is rejected in the Rajya Sabha, Bar and Bench reported.

During the proceedings, Rohatgi further argued that there was an acknowledgement by the Rajya chairperson of the impeachment motion, adding that he had also stated that proceedings under the Judges Inquiry Act had been triggered, Bar and Bench reported.

The advocate argued that this implied that the motion had been admitted in the Rajya Sabha. Rohatgi added that the deputy chairperson cannot sit over the chairperson’s decision in such matters.

The bench listed the matter for further hearing on Thursday, The Indian Express reported.

Earlier, Varma had also challenged the in-house committee report that indicted him in the matter, as well as the recommendation made by Sanjiv Khanna, who was the chief justice of India when the report was submitted to the president and the prime minister to initiate impeachment proceedings against him.

In August, the Supreme Court dismissed both the petitions.