INDIA’S CURRENT HOME MINISTER is no ordinary minister. He is one of the two most powerful leaders of the Union government, one whose words command wide authority. It has been widely reported that in the course of delivering a public speech in Kochi, Kerala, on August 22, 2025, the Union Home Minister made a shocking allegation — that between 2007 and 2011, a judge of the Supreme Court of India was a supporter of Naxalism and that, “driven by” the Naxalist ideology, the judge had delivered a judgment that protected Naxalism.
That judge, Justice Sudarshan Reddy, is currently the opposition candidate in the election for the Vice President of India. The judgment that he referred to was Nandini Sundar v. State of Chhattisgarh (2011), delivered fourteen years ago by a two judge Bench of Justices Reddy and S.S. Nijjar. The order had not been signed as being authored by Justice Reddy alone.
Even as civil society, including several former judges and myself, have critically responded to the home minister’s speech pointing out that his charge is without any basis, the Supreme Court of India has remained silent. But why should the Supreme Court react? What should it do?
The Supreme Court should react because the Union Home Minister’s charge is not only against a person but also a very serious one against the Court itself — alleging that in 2011, the Court harboured a supporter of Naxalism amongst its judges and that one of its orders had been driven by Naxalist ideology.
What the Union Home MInister meant when he referred to ‘Naxalism’ is explained clearly in a very recent (April, 2025) note by the Ministry of Home Affairs entitled “Naxalmukt Bharat Abhiyan: From Red Zones to Growth Corridors: India’s Decisive Battle Against Left Wing Extremism”.
The note defines Naxalism as follows:
“Left Wing Extremism (LWE), often referred to as Naxalism, is one of India's most serious internal security challenges… The movement has aimed to undermine the Indian state through armed rebellion and parallel governance structures, particularly targeting security forces, public infrastructure, and democratic institutions…..”
It is clear, therefore, that what the Home Minister meant on August 22 was that the Supreme Court had a judge who supported the ideology of “[undermining] the Indian state through armed rebellion and parallel governance structures, particularly targeting security forces, public infrastructure, and democratic institutions” and that an order of the Supreme Court was “driven by” this ideology.
The Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, equips the top Court with vast power to respond to charges against it. Section 2(c) of the Act defines “criminal contempt” as the publication (whether by words, spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representations, or otherwise) of any matter or the doing of any other act whatsoever which—(i) scandalises or tends to scandalise, or lowers or tends to lower the authority of, any court; or (ii) prejudices, or interferes or tends to interfere with, the due course of any judicial proceeding; or (iii) interferes or tends to interfere with, or obstructs or tends to obstruct, the administration of justice in any other manner.
The Court has rarely shied from resorting to its contempt powers
On July 31, 1970, in E. M. Sankaran Namboodiripad vs T. Narayanan Nambiar, the then Chief Justice of India, M. Hidayatullah, clarified the scope of criminal contempt, noting, “There are many kinds of contempts [sic]. The chief forms of contempt are insult to Judges, attacks upon them, comment on pending proceedings with a tendency to prejudice fair trial, obstruction to officers of courts, witnesses or the parties, abusing the process of the court, breach of duty by officers connected with the court and scandalising the Judges or the courts. The last form occurs, generally speaking, when the conduct of a person tends to bring the authority and administration of the law into disrespect or disregard. In this conduct are included all acts which bring the court into disrepute or disrespect or which offend its dignity, affront its majesty or challenge its authority. Such contempt may be committed in respect of a Single Judge or a single court but may, in certain circumstances, be committed in respect of the whole of the judiciary or judicial system.” (Emphasis added).
In E. M. Sankaran Namboodiripad, the Supreme Court did not hesitate to use its power under the Contempt of Courts Act against a sitting chief minister’s attack against the judiciary. At a press Conference held in Trivandrum on November 9, 1967, Namboodiripad, the then chief minister of Kerala, and a renowned Marxist theoretician, said that “Marx and Engels considered the judiciary as an instrument of oppression and even today when the State set up has not undergone any change, it continues to be so…judges are guided and dominated by class hatred, class interests and class prejudices and where the evidence is balanced between a well dressed pot-bellied rich man and a poor ill-dressed and illiterate person, the judge instinctively favors the former.”
For saying so, exactly three months later, on February 9, 1968, Namboodiripad, the sitting chief minister, was convicted by the Kerala High Court for contempt and fined Rs. 1000 or face simple imprisonment for a month. The conviction and sentence were upheld by the Supreme Court two and a half years later, on July 31, 1970.
Nor has the Supreme Court dithered in using its power to punish contempt against a sitting judge of a constitutional court. In 2017, the Supreme Court convicted Justice C.S. Karnan, then a sitting High Court judge, for “contempt of the judiciary” and sentenced him to six months imprisonment for levelling a series of allegations against judges and then defying the authority of the Supreme Court when it took action against him.
In the May 9, 2017, judgment convicting Justice Karnan, the Supreme Court said,
“None of the allegations levelled by Justice Karnan were supported by any material. His allegations were malicious and defamatory, and pointedly by name, against many of the concerned Judges. He carried his insinuations to the public at large, in the first instance, by endorsing his letters carefully so as to widely circulate the contents of his communications, to the desired circles…And later, through the internet, he placed his point of view, and the entire material, in the public domain. During the course of hearing of the instant contempt petition, his ridicule of the Supreme Court remained unabated. In fact, it was heightened, as never before…
“...What we have before us is a Judge who has crossed even the most liberal standards of expected and permissible expression of opinion. There is no doubt in our mind that such conduct on the part of the contemnor has brought disrepute to the judicial system and has the potential of shaking the confidence of the average citizen in the system. He has not shown the slightest remorse which could be a mitigating factor. Such conduct and action, if tolerated, would certainly reflect an element of weakness in then system; no such weakness can be allowed to enter the system.”
Justice C.S. Karnan was convicted and sentenced to six months imprisonment, which he served.
In 2020, the Supreme Court convicted and punished Prashant Bhushan, one of the most respected members of its own Bar for contempt of court for stating on social media that, “CJI rides a 50 Lakh motorcycle belonging to a BJP leader at Raj Bhavan Nagpur, without a mask or helmet, at a time when he keeps the SC in Lockdown mode denying citizens their fundamental right to access justice!”. Bhushan had also noted that “When historians in future look back at the last 6 years to see how democracy has been destroyed in India even without a formal Emergency, they will particularly mark the role of the Supreme Court in this destruction, & more particularly the role of the last 4 CJIs.”
The Supreme Court convicted Bhushan on the ground that these words had brought the administration of justice into disrepute and were capable of undermining the dignity and authority of the institution of Supreme Court and the office of the Chief Justice of India in particular.
The top Court has not shied away from punishing one of India’s most celebrated writers when she criticized the judiciary. On March 6, 2002, the Court convicted Arundhati Roy, for “making wild allegations against the court and thereby scandalised its authority”.
What Roy had said, in material part, was that “On the grounds that judges of the Supreme Court were too busy, the Chief Justice of India refused to allow a sitting judge to head the judicial enquiry into the Tehelka scandal, even though it involves matters of national security and corruption in the highest places. Yet when it comes to an absurd, despicable, entirely unsubstantiated petition in which all the three respondents happen to be people who have publicly […..] questioned the policies of the government and severely criticized a recent judgment of the Supreme Court, the Court displays a disturbing willingness to issue notice. It indicates a disquieting inclination on the part of the court to silence criticism and muzzle dissent, to harass and intimidate those who disagree with it. By entertaining a petition based on an FIR [First Information Report] that even a local police station does not see fit to act upon, the Supreme Court is doing its own reputation and credibility considerable harm defended by pleading the truth”.
Arundhati Roy was convicted and punished for contempt by the Supreme Court for this speech with a fine.
That a speech is political speech has no bearing on whether it’s contempt
Against this standard set by the Supreme Court for contempt, there can be little doubt that the August 22, 2025, statement made by the Union Home Minister amounts to contempt of court. Indeed, what the Home Minister said may be the one of the most serious attacks against the top Court ever made by a responsible public official: that the Supreme Court supported an ideology “[undermining] the Indian state through armed rebellion and parallel governance structures, particularly targeting security forces, public infrastructure, and democratic institutions” and that an order of the Supreme Court was “driven by” this ideology.
There is little doubt that this statement by the Home Minister, who has access to secret intelligence, will be believed by large sections of the general public, especially those who admire and follow him.
The Home Minister’s speech has been defended on the ground that it was part of the campaign for election of Vice President of India and was directed against the former judge only in his capacity as the candidate of the opposition in the election. We know that several former judges of the Supreme Court have entered the political arena post retirement. They include, for instance, former Chief Justices of India Koka Subba Rao, M. Hidayatullah, P. Sathasivam and Ranjan Gogoi, as well as former Supreme Court judges Justices Bahrul Islam and S. Abdul Nazeer.
Let us assume that a hypothetical sitting Union Home Minister of India says that one of these judges supported, as sitting judges, an ideology which believes in “[undermining] the Indian state through armed rebellion and parallel governance structures, particularly targeting security forces, public infrastructure, and democratic institutions” and that two judges of the Court gave specific judicial orders driven by this ideology.
In such a situation, would the political roles of the judges targeted by the hypothetical Home Minister deter the Supreme Court from promptly fulfilling its responsibility of safeguarding the faith and confidence of the people in the institution? Should the top Court not assert, in an appropriate manner, that it is impossible for anyone subscribing to such an ideology to become a Supreme Court judge, and that none of these above named judges have, in fact, ever supported such an ideology as sitting judges nor issued judicial orders or judgments driven by such an ideology?
There is no exception in the Contempt of Courts Act for political speech made during an election campaign. Any speech, including political speech not protected by parliamentary privilege, which brings the authority and administration of the law into disrespect, disregard, disrepute or offends its dignity or affronts its majesty would amount to contempt. The only test is whether the speech has the proscribed impact.
What can the Supreme Court do? With respect to criminal contempt, Section 15 of the Contempt of Courts Act provides that the Supreme Court or the High Court, as the case may be, may take action on its own motion or on a motion made by the Attorney General or Advocate General, as the case may be, or by any other person with the consent in writing of the Attorney General or Advocate General, as the case may be.
However, like many others, I too, have personally consistently argued that the archaic, colonial law of criminal contempt for scandalising a court has no place in a democracy and should be repealed. Thus, all said and done, I would not personally recommend that the Supreme Court initiate prosecution for contempt in this or in any other case.
What can the Supreme Court do?
But if not contempt, what action can be taken by the Supreme Court with respect to the statement of the Union Home Minister? At the very minimum, the Supreme Court needs to categorically communicate to the public through an official public statement and reassure the people that:
(i) given the procedures for appointment of judges of the Supreme Court, it is inconceivable that any person supporting an ideology which believes in “[undermining] the Indian state through armed rebellion and parallel governance structures, particularly targeting security forces, public infrastructure, and democratic institutions” could ever become a judge of the Supreme Court;
(ii) it is inconceivable that Justice Sudarshan Reddy is a supporter of such an ideology; and
(iii) it is equally inconceivable that the July 12, 2011, order pronounced by Justices Sudarshan Reddy and S.S. Nijjar, was driven by any such ideology. On the contrary, those orders seek to uphold the Constitution and the rule of law.
It should be made clear that any clarification provided by the Court is meant only to protect the faith and confidence of the people in the institution and that it has no bearing on the fitness or otherwise of Justice Reddy’s candidacy.
However, those who have dragged the Supreme Court into the electoral fray in this manner alone should bear responsibility for the electoral consequences of any statement by the Supreme Court defending public trust and confidence in the highest court of our country.
While retired judges have every legal right to accept political positions, my own personal view is that it would be prudent for retired judges to avoid partisan politics as it could raise, in the public mind, questions over their impartiality during their judicial tenure. However, the decision of a former judge to contest an election or accept a political office does not give anyone the right to falsely attack the Supreme Court under the guise of attacking a candidate for election.
Second, the Supreme Court would do well to suo moto issue notice to the Union Home Minister and ask him to explain his statement as it severely damages the faith and confidence of the people in the Supreme Court and also injures comity between two branches of the State. This will give the Union Home Minister a chance to explain and, if possible, to withdraw the statement.