Welcome to argue here, not before NCLAT: Supreme Court to retired technical member

The Supreme Court on Wednesday saw a rare in-person appearance when Vijai Pratap Singh, a former technical member of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), argued his own writ petition challenging the rule that prohibits former members of the tribunal from practising before it.

A Bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul Pancholi heard the petition.

Singh, who served as a technical member of the NCLAT from October 2019 until his retirement in February 2022, contended that the absolute bar on practice before the tribunal was unreasonable. He suggested that a cooling-off period would be a more proportionate restriction.

"But why this restriction? There can be a cooling-off period," Singh submitted.

Justice Bagchi, however, was unpersuaded. Invoking the principle of judicial independence, he pointed out that the NCLAT occupies a position of special standing in the appellate hierarchy and the appearance of a former member before a sitting colleague who had served alongside him could irreparably colour the perception of ordinary litigants.

"Think about independence of judiciary. You have been a member of the tribunal. It is a super special tribunal. Imagine you appear before another member who was working when you were there. What perception would it create in mind of ordinary litigant?" Justice Bagchi observed.

The Bench further drew a parallel with the bar applicable to retired High Court judges, noting that the restriction Singh was challenging was not unique to the NCLAT. A retired High Court judge, the Bench observed, is free to practice before other High Courts and before the Supreme Court, but is conventionally barred from appearing before the very court where he served.

The rationale, the Bench said, was identical: institutional independence and the integrity of perception cannot be subordinated to individual professional convenience.

The Bench also reminded Singh that the doors of the Supreme Court remained open to him.

"We will welcome you to argue before the Supreme Court," Justice Bagchi said.

Singh thereafter withdrew the petition.

Singh is a 1977-batch UP Judicial Service officer who served at multiple levels of the state judiciary before being appointed as Judicial Member of the NCLT, where he sat at the Kolkata, Allahabad and the Mumbai benches. He was elevated to the post of technical member of the NCLAT in October 2019.

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