The Supreme Court on Monday directed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to probe the incident of mob violence in West Bengal’s Malda district, where seven judicial officers were held hostage for eight hours, during a protest against the removal of names in the Special Intensive Review (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The court also criticized the state’s chief minister for being “stubborn” in not being able to reach the chief justice on the day of the incident, which also involved threatening and assaulting officers.
Days after the Supreme Court took suo motu cognizance of the April 1 events, the NIA informed a bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant that based on the preliminary investigation (PE) lodged in the case, the agency had identified 12 instances in all cases where judicial officials faced coercion or hurdles in discharging SIR duties assigned to them by the Supreme Court.
However, since these cases are under investigation by the state police and do not fall under the scheduled offenses under the NIA Act, it will require a court order to take the investigation to its logical conclusion, it said in a sealed report submitted to the court.
Giving utmost priority to the safety and security of judicial personnel, the Supreme Court, using its extraordinary powers under Article 142 of the Constitution, held, “We, in exercise of power under Article 142 of the Constitution, direct the FIRs to be taken over by the NIA, irrespective of the offenses registered thereunder.”
The state Chief Secretary and Director General of Police along with district officials appeared in court online to tender their apologies after the court summoned them to explain why they should not initiate contempt of court proceedings.
The chief secretary explained that he was on a flight from Delhi to Kolkata in the evening and after landing at 4.30 pm, he did not receive any communication from any official.
“You are so high that the chief justice cannot reach you,” the bench, also comprising Justices Joymalia Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi, observed, referring to the frantic efforts made by the chief justice till late on the night of April 1 to secure the seven judicial staff.
When senior advocate Siddharth Luthra sought to defend the officer, the bench said: “Don’t defend these stubborn officers. We know the way some of these officers are pampered.”
The court noted cases in which district officials simply saw the matter and refused to rescue the female judicial officer involved in the incident.
The court sidestepped the contempt case, noting: “Talk to the CJ and try to make amends for what you did. Only because of the timely intervention of the CJI was something untoward prevented from happening. We hope that the officers now understand well the sense of responsibility and the way they had to react when seven judicial officers were taken hostage.”
The bench said: “It was a motivated, pre-planned and deeply instigated act and was not a usual outburst by the people. The NIA will be at liberty to register further FIRs if, during the investigation, it is found that the crimes have other dimensions or people are involved for different considerations.”
The court ordered the state to hand over the case files and fully cooperate with the NIA team, which was allowed to submit the charge sheet to the NIA court in Kolkata. Luthra noted that two people identified as alleged gang leaders are currently in police custody.
The court allowed the NIA to question them again and submit new case reports when the matter is heard again on April 13. Even as the UNC deployed central forces, the bench said: “There is no doubt about the withdrawal of central forces in view of what happened in the state.”
It has allowed the Election Commission of India to report if the state machinery fails in any circumstance. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared at the Centre, shared a report about a woman judicial officer seeking help and protection to film the situation in the state.
ECI’s lawyer, Dama Sesadari Naidu, shared the video of the incident for the court to see, sparking a political storm in court with senior advocates Kapil Sibal, Kalyan Banerjee, Shyam Divan Menaka Banerjee and Gopal Sankaranarayanan questioning the EC’s impartiality and the Centre’s involvement in the matter.
Mehta even alleged that the new documents are being “engineered” and should not be allowed to be submitted during the appeal stage. The court recognized the problem.
“You now have a large number of 1995 birth certificates being issued in 2025 that make them suspicious. We are fully aware of the risk of allowing new documents,” the council noted.
ECI also said that the bulk of the 6 million objections under the “logical inconsistency” were decided by nearly 500 judicial officers (current and former) from West Bengal along with 200 officers from neighboring Jharkhand and Odisha.
He further informed that the 19 appellate courts to be headed by former Chief Justices and Judges of High Courts have also been constituted to hear appeals arising from orders passed by judicial officers.
The court ordered the Election Commission of India to publish the supplementary list by Monday night without waiting for the digital signatures of judicial officers as some technical problems were reported in the process.
To ensure that the appeal hearings proceed smoothly, the court asked the Chief Justice to form a committee of three retired judges who would hear the appeals to formulate a uniform procedure for the 19 courts to follow.
The court also directed the Election Commission of India to ensure that its nodal officer issues a receipt of receipt of the appeal even for cases filed offline by aggrieved persons approaching the court or district level officers.
The state government along with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who had filed petitions challenging the SIR process, sought a timeline for the courts’ decisions.
“Let us first create the environment that enables the courts to make the most of it. We do not want to rush it,” the court said.
