EXCLUSIVE: Supreme Court Justice Sandeep Mehta asks CJI Surya Kant to replace Rajasthan HC Acting Chief Justice for misusing office

Supreme Court Justice Sandeep Mehta has asked Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant to appoint a Chief Justice from another State to head the Rajasthan High Court "with immediate effect"..In letters dated August 2, August 10 and August 17 accessed by Bar & Bench, Justice Mehta has accused acting Chief Justice Sanjeev Prakash Sharma of manipulating case listings in favour of rich litigants and misusing his administrative powers ahead of his retirement, due later next month..Justice Sharma was appointed as Rajasthan High Court judge in November 2016 and transferred to the Patna High Court in 2022. When he sought repatriation on health grounds, the Collegium headed by then Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud declined the request in March 2023 and sent him instead to the Punjab and Haryana High Court. In May 2025, a fresh Collegium resolution recommended his return to Rajasthan. He went on to become the acting Chief Justice, a post Justice Mehta's letter says he has now held "for more than last 10 months.".In his first letter, dated August 2, Justice Mehta wrote that during his visits to Rajasthan, "numerous Judges of Rajasthan High Court have met me and expressed their anguish at the behaviour of Mr. Justice SP Sharma, who frequently threatens his colleague judges of retributive action including transfer claiming his closeness with Hon'ble the Chief Justice of India.".Justice Mehta's letters draw on a recent Supreme Court observation made by a bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi in an unrelated case. They had flagged a growing trend of judges passing orders for extraneous considerations on the eve of retirement, and judges attempting to "hit sixes" before retiring. Justice Sharma seems to be possessed of a licence to hit sixes ever since the day on which he took over as the Acting Chief Justice, Justice Mehta has written..As evidence, the letters cite two division bench orders of the Rajasthan High Court. In a batch of appeals over what Justice Mehta calls "priceless lands" in the city of Udaipur, the cases were listed before Justice Sharma's own bench at the Jaipur seat, despite an earlier judgment by Justice Sharma himself holding that such principal bench matters at Jodhpur seat could not be moved there.The August 17 letter also alleges that a sitting Rajasthan High Court judge - Justice Uma Shankar Vyas - complained to fellow judges of vindictive conduct by Justice Sharma towards his wife, a senior district judiciary officer. Justice Vyas purportedly claimed that Rajasthan HC Acting Chief Justice Justice Sharma held up the inauguration of a new Jodhpur court building on his "whims and caprices," causing what Justice Mehta calls an "unpardonable" loss to the institution..A separate complaint, written by advocate Pooja Tripathi to Supreme Court Justice Vikram Nath and copied to Justice Mehta among 16 others, alleges that Justice Sharma used his position as acting Chief Justice to secure permanent Lok Adalat appointments in Jaipur and Ajmer for persons close to him, including a childhood friend and the spouses of two district judges.The same complaint alleges that Justice Sharma also forwarded the names of 4 women advocates for elevation to the High Court.Tripathi has further stated that "none of these four lady advocates are in active practice," each said to be linked to a senior lawyer or retired judge close to him..Justice Mehta's letters describe efforts underway to confirm Justice Sharma as the Chief Justice of Rajasthan High Court "despite what he calls "damning evidence".Therefore, he has asked the Collegium to immediately transfer Justice Sharma out of Rajasthan to save the Institution from further carnage."I have been repeatedly requesting you to take a decision for appointing a Chief Justice from another State to Rajasthan High Court so that this unfortunate situation can be prevented. Continued ignorance of the request is, in my opinion, wholly against the interest of the institution," Justice Mehta states..Justice Mehta himself hails from the Rajasthan High Court. He became a judge of the Rajasthan on May 30, 2011. He was transferred as Chief Justice of the Gauhati High Court in February 2023, before his elevation to the Supreme Court on November 9, 2023.