Justice Arun Mishra on Wednesday refused to recuse himself from the Supreme Court Constitution Bench that is hearing a plea to re-examine one of his own judgements on the 2013 Land Acquisition Act.

A bench headed by Mishra and comprising Justices Indira Banerjee, Vineet Saran, MR Shah, and Ravindra Bhat passed the order, Bar and Bench reported. The judges will start hearings in the case from 2 pm on Wednesday. Mishra had refused to recuse himself from the case on October 15 and said that his “conscience is clear, my integrity is clear before God, I will not budge”.

On March 6, 2018, the top court had ruled that a larger bench would re-examine two judgements related to land acquisition that was delivered by two separate benches. Mishra had headed the three-judge bench, which also included Justices AK Goel (now retired) and Mohan M Shantanagoudar, that had passed one of these judgements last year. Another three-judge bench comprising former Chief Justice of India RM Lodha, Justices Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph – all of whom are retired now – had delivered the other ruling in 2014.

The five-judge Constitution Bench will now review the judgements to establish the correctness of the two conflicting decisions on the interpretation of Section 24 of the Land Acquisition Act, 2013.

Last week, Mishra had claimed that social media posts and news channel debates seeking his recusal are not against any particular individual, but malign the court.

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