Serious allegations against the Acting Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court, Justice Sanjeev Prakash Sharma, have come to light following reports of letters written by Supreme Court of India judge Justice Sandeep Mehta to the Chief Justice of India (CJI), in which he has sought Justice Sharma’s immediate transfer. Justice Mehta, who previously served as a judge of the Rajasthan High Court and is regarded for his uprightness, discipline, and integrity, wrote three such letters on August 2, 10, and 17. The contents of these letters are now partly in the public domain.

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Letters that raise serious questions

The letters reportedly refer to complaints about the manner in which Justice Sharma has been functioning. They also highlight alleged instances of victimisation of judges, maladministration, improper “shifting of cases” to his Bench, and nepotism in appointments to the Permanent Lok Adalat. Justice Sharma has allegedly been intimidating some of his colleagues with the threat of retributive measures, including transfers, based on his claimed proximity to the CJI. It is reported that Justice Mehta’s letters refer to specific instances of alleged favouritism towards a chosen few among the lawyers and the misuse of power in his capacity as the “master of the roster”. Justice Mehta’s last letter reportedly expresses concern over the CJI’s alleged inaction, particularly as Justice Sharma is due to retire on September 26. So far, there has been no official denial of the reports concerning the contents of the letters. Justice Sharma, of course, has publicly denied the accusations as baseless.

A High Court functioning without a regular Chief Justice and functioning under an Acting Chief Justice for a considerably long period — in the instant case, for about 11 months — is not a good institutional gesture. The fact that Justice Sharma was earlier transferred to the Patna High Court in 2022, and that his request for repatriation to the Rajasthan High Court was rejected by the Collegium in 2023, which instead proposed his transfer to the Punjab and Haryana High Court, is also not a commendable antecedent. Justice Mehta, according to reports, is said to have wondered how such a judge came to be retransferred to the Rajasthan High Court in 2025 and subsequently allowed to function as the Acting Chief Justice, with wide-ranging administrative and judicial powers.

Of late, there have been two crucial developments. First, lawyers at the Rajasthan High Court staged a sit-in protest on the High Court premises, following which Justice Sharma had to opt out from hearing cases. Second, on August 31, the Supreme Court Collegium recommended the appointment of Justice Sanjay Agrawal as the new Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court. Accordingly Justice Agrawal is now appointed.

Allegations of corruption against sitting judges in India are neither uncommon nor unprecedented. Yet, certain unique features of the present reports are worth noting. A sitting judge of the Supreme Court reportedly alerted the CJI to the conduct of an Acting Chief Justice of a High Court, supported by verifiable material.

Yet, for several weeks, no cogent steps were reportedly initiated by the CJI in this regard. The CJI reportedly said that the allegations could not be treated as findings and that they “must be dealt with strictly through the established institutional mechanism”. In view of Justice Sharma’s impending retirement, early action by the CJI to Justice Mehta’s letter could perhaps have averted some of the disturbing events that subsequently followed.

Transparency International, in its reports, has underlined the growing trust deficit in the Indian judiciary. According to its 2002 report, based on a household survey, the judiciary was identified as the second-most corrupt institution in certain South Asian countries, including India. The report is indeed shocking. Yet, the present situation in India is far more complex and multi-dimensional. There are many fine judges in India’s judiciary whose integrity and public image should not be tarnished because of aberrations elsewhere, whether on or off the Bench.

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Institutional responsibility, structural issues

The repeated episodes of judicial corruption in India reflect certain fundamental issues concerning the functioning of its higher judiciary.

First, the total lack of criteria, coupled with the unavoidable collaboration between the Collegium and the Executive at the Centre under the present system, makes judicial appointments highly partisan, opaque, and often arbitrary. This mechanism and its processes are incapable of identifying the cleanest and most meritorious candidates. The issue of corruption in the judiciary, like many other institutional concerns, is inseparable from the existing method of selecting candidates for judicial office. A system of inviting applications, as is prevalent in Canada, or an independent body for judicial selection, as in the United Kingdom, remains unthinkable in India.

Second, the lack of an effective mechanism to deal with corruption in the higher judiciary in India has had the effect of perpetuating the menace. The Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968, is inadequate to tackle the issue and has, for all practical purposes, become defunct. The Supreme Court, in K. Veeraswami vs Union of India (1991), held that, for registering a First Information Report against a judge of the higher judiciary, the permission of the CJI is a necessary precondition. As lawyer Prashant Bhushan rightly observed, “the police does not dare approach the Chief Justice for permission to investigate, unless they already have clinching evidence, which they cannot get, unless they investigate” (“Judicial Accountability or Illusion?”, Economic and Political Weekly, November 25, 2006). Although the United Progressive Alliance government facilitated the passage of the Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill in the Lok Sabha in 2012, the Bill lapsed with the dissolution of the 15th Lok Sabha in 2014. The subsequent legislative effort to revive the Bill, with some changes, also remained a non-starter. The impeachment of erring judges, as suggested by Articles 124(4) and 217(1)(b) of the Constitution, has proved to be a failure. Likewise, the in-house mechanism adopted by the Supreme Court in 1999 has not proved to be fault-free or even effective.

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Earlier crises, different responses

But these considerations could not have been reasons for the CJI not to act promptly upon the concerns allegedly expressed by Justice Mehta. On the contrary, the lack of a permanent systemic solution to the issues raised should have been an additional reason for the CJI to take remedial measures expeditiously and diligently, and to do whatever was possible within his authority. The situation called for judicial statesmanship. In 1990, when an inquiry was underway against Justice V. Ramaswami for alleged misconduct, he was advised by then CJI Sabyasachi Mukharji, to take leave and keep away from judicial work.

Thereafter, when the impeachment motion against Justice Ramaswami failed in Parliament due to the Congress party’s strategic abstention, the judge attempted to resume judicial work, with about nine months of his tenure remaining.

However, then CJI Venkatachaliah refused to allocate any cases to him for hearing, notes Justice K. Chandru in his book, Who Will Judge the Judges? (2026). Even last year, when partly burnt currency notes were reportedly found in the outhouse of Justice Yashwant Varma at his Delhi residence, then CJI Sanjiv Khanna, quickly transferred him to the Allahabad High Court, where he was not allocated any judicial work, practically. In the reported decision in XXX vs Union of India (2025), the Supreme Court emphasised the responsibility of the CJI in matters relating to judicial integrity and allegations of corrupt practices.

Justice Sharma allegedly claimed that the CJI is proximate to him. This was a factor that led to undesirable and avoidable speculations. Given the nature of the allegations and their immediate verifiability, it was imperative that the CJI acted promptly and convincingly, so that further damage to the system and the institution could have been reduced, if not prevented altogether.

Kaleeswaram Raj is a lawyer at the Supreme Court of India