SC questions Modi government over Justice Vayas's appointment
24 Feb 2012
The Modi government was questioned by the Supreme Court today for bypassing it while making appointments to the post of chairman of a monitoring authority, looking into the investigations of 22 encounter killings in Gujarat during 2002-06.
Expressing displeasure over appointment of former Bombay High Court chief justice K R Vayas in place of former apex court judge, justice M B Shah, who had quit as the panel's head on personal and health grounds, the apex court said it should have also been told about the proposal for the appointment of new chairman, a bench of justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Prakash Desai said.
Senior advocate Ranjit Kumar and Gujarat's additional advocate general Tushar Mehta told the bench that the notification for appointment of justice Vayas, former chairman of Maharashtra Human Rights Commission was issued yesterday as justice Shah had refused to continue as chairman and as per the 25 January order of the apex court, the monitoring panel had to file its interim report in a time-bound manner.
