Retd HC Judge CS Karnan Arrested Over ‘Abusive’ Online Videos

Videos allegedly include threats of sexual violence, sexually colored remarks against judges’ wives, women lawyers.

Justice CS Karnan. 

(Photo: PTI)

Justice CS Karnan, the controversial former judge of the Calcutta and Madras High Courts, was arrested on Wednesday, 2 December, by the Chennai Police.

Following instructions from the Madras High Court, the police has been conducting a probe into the online videos posted by the retired judge, in which he has allegedly made threats of sexual violence and other sexually coloured remarks against the wives of women judges, women lawyers and female court staff.

He is also alleged to have made derogatory comments about judges of the Supreme Court and high courts, accusing some of sexual assault, and naming the alleged survivors from those cases.

The Bar Council of Tamil Nadu had filed a petition asking for an FIR and investigation against Karnan for these videos, while ten women lawyers from the Madras High Court had also written to Chief Justice of India SA Bobde asking for action against the judge.

The Cyber Crime Wing of the Chennai Police registered a case against the former judge on 28 October under sections of the Indian Penal Code, Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Harassment of Women Act and the Information Technology Act, according to the News Minute.

The Madras High Court had on 10 November ordered the blocking of links to Justice Karnan’s videos, which they found to make “scandalous, obscene, vituperative and unparliamentary remarks”.

This is not the judge’s first brush with controversy. In May 2017, he became the first sitting judge of the higher judiciary to be found guilty – by a special seven-judge bench – of criminal contempt of court. This was in connection with the arrest warrants he issued against judges of the Supreme Court accusing them of corruption, following earlier accusations of casteism against fellow judges of the Madras High Court.

Sentenced to six months imprisonment, he avoided arrest for a month, but eventually served his sentence in Kolkata till December 2017. In October this year, he created further controversy for allegedly causing a scene outside former Supreme Court judge Justice R Banumathi’s house in Chennai, and allegedly attempting to force his way inside.