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The lawyer of former Uttar Pradesh chief secretary Neera Yadav, who has been convicted in a land fraud case, was rebuked by a Supreme Court bench on Monday for dropping Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s name during proceedings.

Yadav had filed an appeal in the top court against a four-year jail term for criminal conspiracy and corruption in a case related to allotment of plots for industrial and institutional units in Noida. When her case came up for hearing on Monday, advocate-on-record Prakash Kumar Singh sought an adjournment on the ground that neither of the two senior advocates were available.

“Mr Gopal Subramaniam is unwell. The other senior advocate received an urgent call from Ms Sonia Gandhi and he had to leave the court,” Singh said.

Over the next few seconds, Justice J S Khehar and Justice Arun Mishra spoke to each other, before pulling up Singh.

“What do you think the name should have an effect on us? What do you want to tell us? Is it a show-off or do you want to influence us? We will not tolerate this,” said Justice Khehar. He said it was “totally unfair and wrong” on the part of the lawyer to have dropped Sonia’s name since the court “is not interested in knowing anything beyond the case”.

At this stage, Justice Mishra said that Singh’s statement was sufficient to haul him for contempt. “It is in fact contempt of court. Are you trying to influence the court by saying all this?” he asked Singh.

As the lawyer sought to justify his statement, Justice Khehar said, “Do you think such statements will influence or intimidate us? What kind of impression are you trying to give to us and to the public in general? We cannot let you do this here.”

“Don’t underestimate the authority of this court,” Justice Khehar added.

The bench refused to hear the case any further and asked Singh to “go to some other bench”.

“List after one week, before some other bench. The Registry is directed to obtain necessary instructions for posting of this case from the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India,” the bench ordered.

Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar and Additional Solicitor General Pinky Anand appeared for the CBI in the matter. The court had in April issued notices to the agency on Yadav’s appeal.

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