Madhya Pradesh judge faces mob fury as suo motu case to protect judicial officers sits mute in Supreme Court

Madhya Pradesh Additional District and Sessions Judge Tabassum Khan has faced online abuse and threats ever since June 12, when she sentenced a group of cow vigilantes to life imprisonment for lynching truck driver Sheikh Lala Nazir Ahmed in August 2022. This comes even as a suo motu case to protect judges like her from “pressure, intimidation, threats and actual violence” languishes in the Supreme Court.

The suo motu case was initiated after another Additional District and Sessions Judge Uttam Anand, this time from Dhanbad in Jharkhand, was mowed down by a vehicle while he was out for a morning jog in 2021. He had reportedly rejected bail petitions for some gangsters shortly before his death. The case had sent shockwaves across the nation, compelling the Supreme Court to sit up and take notice.

Then Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana, had summoned senior advocate K.K. Venugopal, who was the Attorney General of India at the time, to express the court’s concern about the rising instances of violence and maligning campaigns against the judiciary.

“There is no freedom for judges to work,” a visibly upset Justice Ramana had said in the open courtroom on August 6, 2021, pointing out that threats, abusive messages, and “peeping” into online accounts take not only a physical but also mental toll on judges.

‘Alarming situation’

A few days later, the top court transferred the investigation of Judge Anand’s death to the Central Bureau of Investigation. Its August 9, 2021 order highlighted the need to “resolve the alarming situation in the country where judicial officers and lawyers are being pressurised and intimidated by threats of, and/or actual violence. There is, therefore, an institutional need to create an environment where judicial officers feel safe and secure.”

The same August 9 order tagged the suo motu case, In re: Safeguarding Courts and Protecting Judges, with an earlier writ petition filed by advocate Karunakar Mahalik, who had said there was a “crying need” for a “special security system to protect court premises and persons related to justice delivery system”.

The Supreme Court website shows that both the suo motu case and the Mahalik petition were last listed on March 21, 2025.

Unequivocal condemnation

The Supreme Court Advocates on Record Association (SCAORA) has issued a statement “unequivocally condemning” the threats and “targeted social media campaign” against Judge Khan. The powerful advocates’ association said the judge had only discharged her judicial duties.  

“Judicial orders are to be challenged before appellate courts, not through intimidation, vilification or threats against judges… The district judiciary forms the backbone of our justice delivery system,” the SCAORA said, expressing solidarity with Judge Khan.

The statement conformed with the Supreme Court’s judgment in the All India Judges Association versus Union of India case that the “independence of the district judiciary must also be equally a part of the basic structure of the Constitution”. That judgment, authored by Justice P.S. Narasimha for a three-judge Bench, had held in May 2023 that justice, which was a “Preambular goal”, would remain illusory without impartial and independent judges in the district judiciary.

Criminal contempt

In a 1991 judgment in Delhi Judicial Service Association, Tis Hazari Court, Delhi versus State of Gujarat, the Supreme Court had held that “those who have to discharge duty in a Court of Justice are protected by the law, and shielded in the discharge of their duties”.

That case concerned the shocking incident of the Chief Judicial Magistrate at Nadiad in Gujarat, who was forced to consume liquor, assaulted, tied up with a rope, handcuffed by police officers, and photographed.

The 1991 verdict had observed that any deliberate interference with the discharge of duties, either in or outside the courtroom, by attacking a judicial officer, would amount to criminal contempt, adding that courts “must take serious cognisance” of such actions.