Sit in a corner till court ends: Supreme Court to M Nageshwar Rao

It was a unique punishment that the Supreme Court doled out on Tuesday to CBI's senior-most officer who till a week ago reigned as its interim chief, M Nageshwar Rao: a fine of Rs 1 lakh and a direction to remain seated in a corner till the court rose for the day. He was being held guilty of contempt of court for "wilful disobedience" as he had approved the transfer of joint director AK Sharma while he was heading the probe team in the Muzaffarpur shelter home case.

However, he was not alone to bear the ignominy. The bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justices LN Rao, and Sanjiv Khanna handed down a similar punishment to the CBI's assistant legal advisor (ALA) S Bhasuran, who sat beside Rao inside court no 1 for almost four hours. This is the first instance of such a punishment for contempt since 1994 when former UP CM Kalyan Singh was given a similar punishment.

The bench held that as the case was under the court's monitoring, Sharma was protected against being removed or transferred. Any order to this effect could be passed only with prior approval from the court. In this case, Bhasuran gave the legal opinion while Rao signed the transfer file.

Interestingly, Rao's file noting showed that he was aware of the SC's orders and so sought a legal opinion from Bhasuran. He was advised that since Sharma was to get a promotion, there appeared to be no legal hurdle, but sounded out the need to seek prior SC approval. However, he suggested it could also be done after relieving Sharma by filing an affidavit to that end in court. "He is no less an officer than the Acting Director of CBI. Would heavens have fallen if the relieving order was passed one day later after taking Court into confidence?" asked the bench. Attorney General KK Venugopal defended Rao by terming it an "error of judgment" for which Rao apologized. "Our orders were clear not to touch him (Sharma)..If this is not contempt, then what is?"

When the bench threatened to send the officers behind bars for 30 days, A-G pleaded, "To err is human, but to forgive is divine." The bench, however, responded, "In the past 20 years, never did we use our contempt powers. But there has to be a first time."