Apologise by 24th & we’ll be lenient: SC tells Bhushan

‘Would be insincere to apologise for tweets that expressed my bona fide belief’

The Supreme Court of India on Thursday granted time till August 24 to advocate Prashant Bhushan to reconsider his "defiant statement" that he read out to the court in which he refused to apologise for his contemptuous tweets. The court said that if he modifies his statement and admits to making a mistake from the “core of his heart,” it would take a “very lenient view”.

Saying that he was “pained” at being “grossly misunderstood,” Mr Bhushan told the threejudge bench comprising Justice Arun Mishra, Justice B.R. Gavai and Justice Krishna Murari that his two tweets were not written in “absence mindedness” and that he would not offer an apology for them as they “expressed what was and continues to be my bona fide belief”.

“I don’t want to consider it” and “I don’t think it is likely,” Mr Bhushan reiterated as Justice Mishra said, “Thinking process is always better… don’t say later on that I was not given time.”

Late on Thursday evening, the order posted on the Supreme Court's website said, “We have given time to the contemptor

I do not ask for mercy. I do not appeal to magnanimity. I am here, therefore, to cheerfully submit to any penalty that can lawfully be inflicted upon me… — Prashant Bhushan

to submit unconditional apology, if he so desires. Let it be filed by 24.08.2020… In case, apology is submitted, the case to be posted for consideration on 25.08.2020”.

Attorney general of India K.K. Venugopal, who briefly addressed the court for the first time in the matter on Thursday, said that the contempt of court proceedings against Mr Bhushan for his two tweets should end with the court holding him guilty of criminal contempt. He should not be punished. “I make the request to your lordships not to punish him. Your lordships have held him guilty of contempt,” Mr Venugopal said, clarifying that he was speaking as AG and not for the Government of India. ■

But Mr Bhushan, defiant and unrelenting, quoted Mahatma Gandhi to the court.

“I did not tweet in a fit of absence mindedness. It would be insincere and contemptuous on my part to offer an apology for the tweets that expressed what was and continues to be my bona fide belief. Therefore, I can only humbly paraphrase what the Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi had said in his trial: 'I do not ask for mercy. I do not appeal to magnanimity. I am here, therefore, to cheerfully submit to any penalty that can lawfully be inflicted upon me’…,” he told the court.

The AG’s plea was declined by the court which said that “the way he (Bhushan) has worded his statement, we cannot accept your argument. We are giving him time to consider” modification of his statement. Justice Mishra made it clear that if Mr Bhushan reconsiders and modifies his statement and admits to making a mistake from the “core of his heart,” they would take a “very lenient view”.

The hearing saw Justice Mishra repeatedly asking Mr Bhushan to reconsider and make modifications to his statement that he had read out to the court, but Mr Bhushan was unrelenting and stood his ground. “The statement is well considered and thought out and it is unlikely to make any substantial change,” Mr Bhushan said. On being asked again and again, he finally said, “I will consider and discuss with my lawyers”.

At this juncture, Justice Mishra said, “We should not give verdict now” and gave Mr Bhushan two-three days time to reconsider his statement.

When Justice Mishra pointed to maintaining a “balance” and not crossing the Lakshman rekha while saying anything critical of the court, senior counsel Rajeev Dhavan said that Lakshman Rekha applies to judicial restraint as well. Saying that when the August 14 judgment holding Mr Bhushan guilty of criminal contempt goes to academic circles it will be criticised, Mr Dhavan told the court that holding that the tweets in questions were not bonafide is not enough, as malafide with malicious intent too has to be established.