Prashant Bhushan held guilty of contempt by the SC for his tweets against CJI, judiciary.
The Supreme Court will hear the arguments on the quantum of punishment on August 20, after holding Prashant Bhushan guilty contempt over his tweets against the judiciary and CJI.
On Friday, the Supreme Court of India held advocate Prashant Bhushan guilty of contempt over his tweets against the Chief Justice of India (CJI) and the judiciary. A bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra registered a case against him over his two tweets and revealed that the court will hear the arguments on the quantum of punishment on 20th August. The senior lawyer could be punished for up to six months of simple imprisoned or fined up to INR 2000, or with both.
SC bench holds Prashant Bhushan in contempt for disrespecting the judiciary and CJI:
Prashant Bhushan on 29th June had tweeted on a photo of Chief Justice of India SA Bobde sitting on a Harley Davidson motorcycle. The bench comprising of Justice B R Gavai and Krishna Murari took note of another attack on the judiciary by Bhushan via a tweet on June 27. Bhushan defended his posts by saying that his tweets were against the judges regarding their conduct in a personal capacity, did not want to obstruct the administration of justice.
SC makes Twitter a party to the matter of the alleged tweets made by Prashant Bhushan:
Twitter has also been added a party to the matter by the apex court’s bench. Senior advocate Sajan Poovayya, appearing for Twitter, submitted that Bhushan made tweets on Twitter Inc., California, USA, and urged the court to replace Twitter India with it. He said Twitter will disable the tweet identified by the Registry if the court directs it to, and clarified that it had nothing to defend in the matter.
Prashant Bhushan is appearing in the Supreme Court for the Public Interest Litigation, seeking transfer of PM CARES funds to the National Disaster Response Fund.
