Supreme Court suggests judges be ‘hermits’ and keep away from social media, Facebook commentary. Here’s why

The Supreme Court on December 11 suggested that judges live like “hermits” and “work like a horse”, including avoiding social media use or posting their opinions about judgements online, according to a PTI report.

Hearing a case on the termination of two judicial officers by the Madhya Pradesh High Court, the SC bench comprising justices BV Nagarathna and N Kotiswar Singh made oral remarks on the judiciary having “no place for flamboyance”.

‘No Facebook. No Comments, Have to Sacrifice…’

“Judicial officers should not go to Facebook. They should not comment on judgments because tomorrow if the judgment is cited, judge has already expressed one way or the other. It is an open platform…You have to live life a hermit, work like a horse. So much sacrifice judicial officers have to do. They should not go into Facebook at all,” the bench said in an oral observation.

Representing one of the terminated staff, senior advocate R Basant said he backed the SC bench’s opinion, adding that no judicial officer or judge should go to Facebook to post anything related to their work.

The topic arose after senior advocate Gaurav Agarwal, who is amicus curiae, submitted complaints against the terminated woman judge before the SC and informed the bench that she had also made a post on Facebook.

SC Suo Moto Hearing

The apex court on November 11, 2023, took a suo motu cognisance of the termination of six women civil judges by the Madhya Pradesh government for unsatisfactory performance.

Notably, a full court of the MP High Court reconsidered its earlier resolutions on August 1, and decided to reinstate four officers under certain terms and conditions. Those reinstated were Jyoti Varkade, Rachna Atulkar Joshi, Sushri Priya Sharma and Sushri Sonakshi Joshi. However, Aditi Kumar Sharma and Sarita Chaudhary were left out from the reinstatement exercise.

The top court was considering the cases of the judges, who joined Madhya Pradesh judicial service in 2018 and 2017, respectively.

According to a report submitted by the HC, Sharma’s performance dropped from very good and good ratings during 2019-2020 to average and poor in the subsequent years. In 2022, she had about 1,500 pending cases with disposal rate below 200, it was stated. She however informed the HC about suffering a miscarriage in 2021, followed by her brother’s cancer diagnosis.

Fundamental Rights Violated?

She alleged her termination from service was a violation of her fundamental rights under Articles 14 (right to equality before law) and 21 (right to life and personal liberty) of the Constitution.

In her application, she said if the period of her maternity and child care leave was taken into consideration in the quantitative work assessment, it would be a grave injustice to her.

“It is a settled law that maternity and child care leave is a fundamental right of a woman and also the infant, therefore, evaluation of the applicant’s performance for the probation period on the basis of the leave taken by her as part of maternity and child care is grossly violative of her fundamental rights,” it said.

While taking cognisance of the termination, the bench issued notices to the HC registry and the judicial officers who had not approached it against the termination. “The judges were terminated despite the fact that a quantitative assessment of their work could not be done on account of the COVID-19 outbreak,” the court noted.