Justice Subhash Vidyarthi of Allahabad High Court on Monday recused from hearing the petition seeking criminal proceedings against Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi for allegedly holding a passport of the United Kingdom.
Justice Vidyarthi had last week dictated an order directing the registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against Gandhi. However, the Court later withheld the order, stating that it needed to consider whether Gandhi should be heard before issuing such a direction to the police.
Today, the Bench took note of certain social media posts by petitioner S Vignesh Shishir, in which he purportedly questioned the decision to withhold the order for the FIR.
"The aforesaid messages posted by the petitioner on social media indicate that he is casting aspersions against this Court because the Court had not signed and uploaded the order that was dictated in open Court on 17.04.2026, for the reason recorded in the order dated 17.04.2026 signed and uploaded on the website of this Court. The messages indicate that the petitioner has lost faith in this Court," the judge said.
The judge added that in one of his social media posts, the petitioner had even sought public opinion on whether he should request the Court to issue notice to Gandhi and direct his personal appearance.
"The aforesaid first three messages posted by the petitioner on social media indicate that he has cast aspersions on this Court, but thereafter he has sought a public opinion as to whether he should proceed with the matter before this Court," the Court noted.
Thus, Justice Vidyarthi opined that it would not be appropriate for him to hear the matter any further. The Court refused the petitioner’s request that it not recuse itself and also rejected his explanation that he had expressed appreciation for the direction to register an FIR against Gandhi.
"The Courts do not get influenced by the appreciation of litigants. However, the messages quoted above posted after passing of the order dated 17.04.2026 amount to casting aspersions on this Court and keeping those in consideration, I find it appropriate to recuse from hearing this case," Justice Vidyarthi said.
The Court had on April 17 found a prima facie case against Gandhi and dictated a judgment in open court granting liberty to the State to refer the case to the Central government for its investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
However, the Court later opined that it might have to hear Gandhi first before passing such a direction. Hence, the judge withheld the earlier order passed by him.
This was after it came across a judgment of the High Court as per which the suspect has to be heard before the Court can direct investigation by the police.
Following the Court's decision to not proceed with the direction for FIR against Gandhi, Shishir in a post on X had demanded that the order dictated in open court be made public.
"In this extra ordinary circumstances which has occured in last 24 hours. I would like to Request All The People of India to kindly urge the Hon'ble Chief Justice of India to kindly Direct the Hon'ble Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court at Lucknow Bench to kindly type and upload the Judgement which is dictated and pronounced in Open Court as matter pertains to National Security of India and Concerning Larger Public Interest of Every Indian Citizen about a Foreign National sitting in Lok Sabha Since Last 22 years," Shishir wrote.
Shishir, who is from Karnataka, in his plea has sought registration of a criminal case against Gandhi under various provisions of Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), Official Secrets Act, Passport Act and the Foreigners Act.
His claim is that Gandhi was the Director of the UK-based company Backops Ltd and in its records, he had declared his nationality as British.
After the police failed to register a case on the complaint, Shishir had moved the trial court. However, after the trial court rejected his plea, he moved the High Court.
The complainant had earlier asked the Ministry of Home Affairs to cancel Gandhi's Indian citizenship on the ground that he has already acquired the British citizenship.
In August 2025, the High Court directed the Union government to provide personal security officer (PSO) of Central Armed Police Forces to Shishir for his round-the-clock security.
[Read Order]