Two former High Court judges dropped from government panel

NEW DELHI: Two former Kerala High Court judges who are currently practising in the Supreme Court after retirement have been dropped from the state government’s panel of senior lawyers. The move is reportedly linked to their decision to join the BJP. The two senior advocates are V Chidambaresh and P N Ravindran.

The state Cabinet, which approved the panel of senior advocates to represent the government in the Supreme Court on Wednesday, also dropped two lawyers considered supporters of the CPM. They are P V Surendranath, national general secretary of the All India Lawyers Union, and P V Dinesh, who is associated with the Left. All four had been part of the panel during the previous LDF government.

At the same time, the new panel includes Devadatt Kamat, who had appeared for Congress leader V M Sudheeran in a petition filed against former Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan in the Lavalin case.

The Cabinet has approved a list of more than 33 senior advocates, including former Attorney General K K Venugopal, Kapil Sibal, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, V Giri, Jaideep Gupta, R Basant, Siddharth Luthra, Shaji P Chali, Romy Chacko, C S Vaidyanathan, Mukul Rohatgi and Raghend Basant.

Mullaperiyar legal team expanded

The state has also expanded its legal team to represent Kerala in the Mullaperiyar case. Supreme Court advocate Roy Abraham had earlier been appointed as Kerala’s Special Counsel in the case. Senior advocate Mohan V Katarki was also appointed to the team.

Senior advocate Jaideep Gupta and James P Thomas, the government’s Standing Counsel in the Supreme Court, have now been included in the team. They will also represent Kerala before tribunals, in addition to the Supreme Court, in inter-state river water disputes.