(1.) ONE P.S. Karunakaran is the applicant before us who has filed this application under R.152 of the High Court Rules with a prayer that he be impleaded as an additional respondent in Writ Appeal No. 1497 of 2004. This Writ Appeal came up for hearing before us yesterday and the same was admitted to hearing. The dispute in the Writ Appeal pertains to the selection of Munsiff Magistrates for the six vacancies meant for reserved category candidates against which candidates from the open category had been selected. It is stated in the application that the judgment under appeal affects a large number of members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the State of Kerala whom the applicant claims to represent. He also claims to represent a Trust registered under T.C. Act 21 of 1955 which is said to be committed to the welfare of the members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. It is further averred that the Trust considers it necessary to put forward its points of view in support of the judgment under appeal to protect the interests of the members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and it is for this reason that the prayer for impleadment has been made.
(2.) WE have heard the learned counsel for the applicant. R.152 of the High Court Rules deals with petitions filed under Arts.226 and 227 of the Constitution. It provides that the Court may order notice of the petition to any person not made party thereto. It further provides that at the time of hearing of the petition for admission or at a later stage, any person, who desires to be heard in the matter and "appears to the Court to be a proper person to be heard" may be heard even if he is not a party to the proceedings. Even if this Rule were to apply to the Writ Appeals, we are of the view that the applicant is not a 'proper person' to be heard. As already observed, the dispute in the Writ Appeal pertains to the selection of Munsiff Magistrates by the High Court. The applicant did not make a prayer before the learned single Judge for being impleaded as a party. He was not even a candidate for selection. It is, therefore, not necessary to hear him in the Writ Appeal either. The issue to be decided in the Writ Appeal revolves around the interpretation of the Rules and it is not necessary for the representatives of any class or community to appear before the Court either in support of the judgment or to oppose it. We are clearly of the view that the applicant is neither a necessary party nor a proper party so as to be allowed to be impleaded as a respondent in the Writ Appeal. The learned counsel for the applicant placed reliance on a judgment of the Apex Court in Nair Service Society v. District Officer. K.P.S.C. (2003 (3) KLT 1126) to contend that the Supreme Court had allowed the Society consisting of the Nair community to file an appeal before it by way of public interest litigation. That could be done, but a person like the applicant, who is a pro bono publico, is not necessary to be heard as a party respondent. The Writ Appeal pending in the Court is not by way of public interest litigation and is a service matter in which only concerned parties can be heard. The judgment relied upon by the learned counsel for the applicant does not apply to the facts of the case nor does it advance the case of the applicant.
(3.) IT is true that the Chief Justice had taken a decision on the administrative side to prefer an appeal against the judgment of the learned single Judge but that does not, in our opinion, preclude him from hearing the Writ Appeal. It is not unusual that Judges deal with matters on the administrative side in the discharge of their functions and when those issues are brought before them on the judicial side they hear them and take an objective view thereon after hearing the parties and quite often reverse their earlier decisions taken on the administrative side. The learned single Judge who decided the Writ Petition out of which the Writ Appeal has arisen was in the Full Court which approved the selections and yet rightly heard the matter and took a view that he thought was right. Such is the glory and tradition of our judicial system. It cannot even remotely be suggested that there is any bias or impropriety when Judges decide the same issues on the judicial side. They are not personally interested in the lis and therefore they cannot be said to be judges in their own cause. The judgments cited by the counsel for the applicant are cases where personal bias was alleged and do not apply to the case in hand.