Congress Slams Govt Over Ex-SC Judge's Appointment As Governor, Calls It 'Great Threat' To Independence Of Judiciary

The government on Sunday appointed six new faces as gov🐎ernors, inclu🎀ding Nazeer, who was part of the historic 2019 Ayodhya verdict, and four BJP leaders, besides carrying out a rejig of the gubernatorial posts in seven states.

Nazeer, who retired on January 4, has been part of several path-breaking verdicts, 💎including those on the politically sensitive Ayodhya land dispute, instant 'triple talaq' and the one that declared 'right to privacy' a fundamen🐽tal right.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh tagged a video on Twitter of former Union minister Arun Jaitley saying in 2012 that "pre-retirement judgements are influ🔴encꦐed by post-retirement jobs".

"Adequate proof of this in the past 3-4 years for sure,&qu💜ot; Ramesh tweeted along with the video.

Asked about Nazeer's appointment, Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said at a press conference, "One of your (BJP) tall leaders sadly no more with us, Arun🎀 Jaitley, on September 5, 2013 in the House and several times outside stated that 'the desire of a post-retirement job influences pre-retirement judgements. It is a threat to the Independence of the judiciary'."

He also🌺 dismissed the argument that this has happened several times e๊arlier also so such an appointment is acceptable.

"We are not talking about persons or individuals. Personally, I have very great respect for this person (N🌄azeer). I know him, it is not about him at all. As a matter of principle we oppose it, as a matter of principle we believe it is a matter of great diminution and a great threat to the Independence of the judiciary for the reasons I have just quoted on the excerpt I played out," Singhvi said, referring to Jaitley's remarks.

"♋Therefore, we condemn it, we opp🎐ose it and we do not agree with it," the Rajya Sabha MP said.