Supreme Court upset over registry not listing matter related to Adani Power despite order

New Delhi, January 23

The Supreme Court on Tuesday got upset with its registry for not listing a matter related to Adani Power despite a judicial order.

As the bench of Justices Aniruddha Bose and PV Sanjay Kumar began the day’s proceedings, it asked senior advocate Dushyant Dave about the Adani Power case.

Dave, who appears for Jaipur Vidyut Vitran Nigam Limited in the case, told the apex court that when lawyers associated with him approached the registry and asked about the matter, officials there said they had no instructions for listing it.

“If the government were to ignore the court’s orders, it would be treated as contempt, but when the registry defies the court’s orders, should it not be viewed seriously?” Dave asked the bench.

The bench wanted to know why and at whose behest the registry had not listed the case for hearing.

“Why? At whose behest? Directed by whom?” the judges asked and summoned a senior registry official to the court and discussed the matter with him in the chambers.

The matter has now been listed as the first case for hearing on Wednesday.

Earlier, Jaipur Vidyut Vitran Nigam Ltd, a power distribution company wholly-owned and run by the State of Rajasthan, had written a letter to the Supreme Court Secretary General seeking an enquiry into the listing of an application filed by Adani Power Rajasthan Limited (APRL) in a case already decided by the apex court two years ago.

The letter said the listing of APRL’s application “raises an extraordinarily serious question going to the very root of the institutional integrity of the Supreme Court’s Registry”.