Apex court reprimands retried judge for flirting with a junior

The Supreme Court today said a judge “sending offensive and improper messages to (a) junior officer and flirting with her is not acceptable”. These observations were made during a hearing of the petitions by a former judicial officer from Madhya Pradesh, appealing against the disciplinary action by the High Court in a sexual harassment case.

 Senior counsel Ravindra Srivastava, representing the HC, said, “He is a senior judicial officer. His conduct should have been more appropriate while dealing with a woman officer.”

Appearing for the Madhya Pradesh High Court, Srivastava read out before a bench headed by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) SA Bobde the WhatApp messages sent by the petitioner to the complainant lady officer.

“Such conduct by a senior judge for a junior lady judge is not acceptable at all,” said an SC bench, headed by Chief Justice of India, as it heard an appeal by the retired judge against the disciplinary proceedings, initiated suo motu (on its own) by the Madhya Pradesh high court.

The bench, also comprising justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, took note of the WhatsApp messages of a former judicial officer referred to by the counsel for the High Court Registrar and said that they were quite “offensive”.