Kolkata: Senior counsel Parthasarathi Sengupta, while making his arguments in response to senior counsel Kalyan Banerjee's plea in a recent contempt case before the Calcutta High Court Thursday, submitted that the chief justice of a high court enjoys certain general powers under the Constitution that a rule of the Contempt of Courts Act couldn't take away.
Sengupta was arguing over the maintainability of the contempt rule issued by a division bench of justices Arijit Banerjee, Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya and Rajarshi Bharadwaj against TMC's Kunal Ghosh and seven others in connection with the ruckus where a mob stamped on a photo of a high court judge. He submitted that the chief justice didn't issue the contempt rule.
Sengupta submitted that the division bench, after seeking affidavits, issued the contempt rule on its own motion. He argued that the advocate general's taking cognisance of the complaint was not mandatory for the high court to take cognisance of the complaint. The bench will hear the matter again on Aug 14.