‘Judges also make mistakes, why the hesitation in admitting it’, Supreme Court corrected its mistake, know the matter

New Delhi : Even judges can make mistakes. Why should there be any hesitation in admitting this? If a mistake has been made, the courts should correct it even when the case is closed. This comment has been made by the Supreme Court itself. Not only this, the apex court has also corrected the mistakes in one of its old decisions. The bench issued a revised order. The Supreme Court admitted that judges can also make mistakes. The apex court has said that courts should not shy away from admitting mistakes in their orders and correcting them even after the case is closed. This case is related to the one-year-old order of the Supreme Court giving interim protection to Indiabulls Housing Finance and its officials. In this order, the Supreme Court had stayed the proceedings against them in cases of debt recovery and money laundering. Now the Supreme Court has admitted that ‘some errors were left in its order.’

The Supreme Court admitted that the order to stay the action of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) was passed without giving it an opportunity to be heard. ED had sought a modification of the order. There was another flaw in the judgment delivered by Justice Krishna Murari and Justice Sanjay Kumar. On one hand, the parties were asked to go to the High Court to raise their grievances, but on the other hand interim protection was granted which would continue till the case was pending in the High Court.

Usually, the Supreme Court’s protection lasts until the parties approach the High Court. In such a case, the Supreme Court leaves it to the High Court to decide on interim protection.

On Tuesday, a bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Arvind Kumar acknowledged both the errors and modified the order. The bench said that interim protection in recovery proceedings will remain till the parties approach the High Court. After this, it will be the job of the High Court to decide on the interim order.

“The stay of proceedings in the writ petitions granted by this Court in respect of the first three FIRs was directed to continue till the disposal of the writ petitions to be filed before the High Court. When a party is referred to the High Court for his/her remedy, in the normal course, it would not be appropriate to bind the said Court with directions in respect of the proceedings challenged before such Court. Ordinarily, this Court would leave all issues open to the party to raise before the High Court,” the bench said.

The bench said that the Supreme Court is a court of last resort and hence it will not shy away from accepting any mistake in its orders. If any mistake is found in the order, it will be ready to correct it. Accepting the ED’s plea, the bench withdrew that part of its order passed on July 4 last year which mentioned the money laundering case.

Citing the Supreme Court’s judgment in V K Jain vs Delhi High Court, the bench said, “Our legal system recognises the possibility of error on the part of judges. Though this observation was made in the context of judges of the district judiciary, it would equally apply to those at higher echelons of the judicial hierarchy. As courts of record, it is necessary that constitutional courts recognise errors that may have crept into their judicial orders… and rectify them.”