Amitha Muraleedharan
Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave had lodged a “strong protest” with the Secretary-General pointing out that Goswami’s petitions before the top court are listed urgently, while other similarly placed litigants are kept waiting.
Within hours, Arnab Goswami’s wife, Samyabrata Ray Goswami, has come to her husband’s defence.
“When I read Dave’s letter, I am shocked and horrified at the extent to which certain vested interests are at work.”
“The selective targeting of my husband’s petition by Shri Dave will have to be opposed by me given his silence on other matters which were taken up by this Hon’ble Supreme Court in its wisdom with urgency in the past,” the letter to SC given by Satyabrata stated.
She cited three cases:
- Romila Thapar case, 2019 – The case was filed and listed for hearing on the same day.
- Vinod Dua’s case in 2020 was taken up for urgent hearing on Sunday.
- Prashant Bhushan’s petition against the FIR filed by Gujarat Police.
She questioned why the Senior lawyer did not raise any issue of selective listing by the registry then.
It was on Tuesday morning Goswami had approached the Supreme Court against Bombay High Court, denying him interim bail in the 2018 suicide abetment case of interior designer Anvay Naik and his mother, Kumud Naik.
Though the Supreme Court is closed for Diwali break, Goswami’s petition got listed for hearing on Wednesday, which prompted Dave to write to the Secretary-General.
She had suggested that the letter by Dave was to taint his husband’s character by selectively targeting him.
Goswami’s petition is to be heard today by a Division Bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Indira Banerjee.
