Petty of judges to avoid judicial precedents: SC

NEW DELHI: Judges do not sit to settle scores and a vindictive stance is incompatible with their oath to uphold the Constitution and the law, the Supreme Court underlined while emphasising that an attempt to dilute or avoid a binding precedent conveys a “measure of pettiness”, inconsistent with the detachment that judicial reasoning demands.

- Utkarsh Anand

“The gavel is an instrument of reason and not a weapon of reprisal... Judges across our country must remember that collegiality is the companion virtue of independence and that a reversal on appeal is not a personal affront but the ordinary operation of a constitutional hierarchy that corrects error and settles law. Respect for the senior jurisdiction is not subservience. It is an acknowledgment thatall courts pursue a common enterprise to do justice according to law,” held a bench of justices Vikram Nath and PB Varale.