Delhi High Court judge Justice Yashwant Varma, who is currently under the lens following the allegations that a large pile of unaccounted cash was discovered at his residence last week, said on Saturday that the visuals depicting a burnt cash pile appeared to be “a conspiracy to frame and malign” him.
In his written explanation furnished to the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court (HC), Justice Varma said that he was shocked to see the contents of the video.
“I was shocked to see the contents of the video since that depicted something which was not found on site as I had seen it. It was this which prompted me to observe that this appeared to be a conspiracy to frame and malign me,” Justice Varma said, as quoted by IANS. As per the judge, the incident tends to give credence to his “firm belief that the entire incident is part of a sequence of events which occurred in the recent past including the unfounded allegations that circulated on social media in December 2024”.
“I unequivocally state that neither I nor any of my family members had stored or kept any cash or currency in that storeroom at any point of time. Our cash withdrawals, made from time to time, are all documented and always through regular banking channels, the use of UPI applications and cards. In so far as the allegation of the recovery of cash, I once again make it clear that no one from my house ever reported seeing any currency in the burnt form in the room,” said Justice Varma.
He further stated that the storeroom, where the fire broke out, was generally utilised by all and sundry to store articles such as unused furniture, bottles, crockery, mattresses, used carpets, old speakers, garden implements as well as Central Public Works Department material.
Justice Varma also said that the room is “unlocked and accessible both from the official front gate as well as the backdoor of the staff quarters” and “is disconnected from the main residence and is surely not a room in his house”. During the exercise to douse the fire, all staff and the members of his household were asked to move away from the scene of the incident in view of safety concerns, said the judge, adding that after the fire was doused, they (all staff and family members) saw no cash or currency on site.
“The very idea or suggestion that this cash was kept or stored by us is totally preposterous. The suggestion that one would store cash in an open, freely accessible and commonly used storeroom near the staff quarters or in an outhouse verges on the incredible and incredulous,” IANS quoted Justice Varma as saying. He added: “It is a room which is completely disassociated from my living areas and a boundary wall demarcates my living area from that outhouse. I only wish that the media had conducted some enquiry before I came to be indicted and defamed in the press.”
“Assuming without admitting that the video was taken immediately at the time of the incident at the site, none of it appears to have been recovered or seized. The second aspect which I need to underscore is that none of the staff was shown any remnants of cash or currency that may have been present on site,” he also said.
Justice Varma asserted that neither his daughter, personal secretary nor household staff were shown these so-called sacks of burnt currency and when they accessed the storeroom, there was no currency, burnt or otherwise, which could be seen.
“In the life of a judge, nothing matters more than reputation and character. That has been severely tarnished and irreparably damaged. This incident has scarred my reputation built over more than a decade as a Judge of a High Court, and it has left me with no means to defend myself. I would also beseech you to bear in consideration that in all my years as a Judge of a High Court, no such allegation had ever been made in the past nor any doubt cast on my integrity,” he said.
Denying and outrightly rejecting the insinuation that he removed currency from the storeroom, the Delhi HC Judge said, “We were neither shown nor handed over any sacks of burnt currency. In fact, and as stated above, the limited debris which was sought to be salvaged continues to exist in one part of the residence”. On Friday, Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sanjiv Khanna constituted a three-member committee to conduct an inquiry against Justice Varma.
“The Chief Justice of India has constituted a three-member Committee consisting of Justice Sheel Nagu, Chief Justice of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana; Justice G.S. Sandhawalia, Chief Justice of the High Court of Himachal Pradesh; and Anu Sivaraman, Judge of the High Court of Karnataka, for conducting an inquiry into the allegations against Justice Yashwant Varma, a sitting Judge of the High Court of Delhi,” said a press statement released by the Supreme Court.
It added that the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court for the time being has been asked not to assign any judicial work to Justice Yashwant Varma.
(With IANS Inputs)
