CJI grants consent to initiate contempt proceedings against Kunal Kamra

• Attorney general K K Venugopal has granted his consent to initiate contempt proceedings against stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra in connection with a tweet he posted on Chief Justice of India S A Bobde on November 18.

• The consent came on a request made by Allahabad-based Advocate Anuj Singh.

• Granting consent under Section 15 of the Contempt of Courts Act, Venugopal wrote the tweet was "grossly vulgar and obnoxious".

• "…and I have no doubt that it would tend to lower the authority of the Supreme Court of India as well as undermine the confidence that the litigant public have in the institute of the Supreme Court itself," he wrote.

• On November 12, Venugopal had granted his consent for initiation of criminal contempt of court proceedings against Kamra for his tweets on the Supreme Court the day before. Kamra had posted the tweets the day a vacation bench of the court granted interim bail to Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami in an alleged abetment to suicide case.

• The consent followed multiple letters of requests to the AG, including those from ShrirangKatneshwarkar, a law student from Aurangabad; Rizwan Siddiquee, an advocate; and Pune-based lawyers Amey Abhay Sirsikar and Abhishek Sharad Raskar.

• "I have gone through each one of the tweets which you have annexed for consent to proceed by way of criminal contempt against Sh. Kunal Kamra. The tweets which I am extracting below are not only in bad taste but clearly cross the line between humour and contempt of the court," Venugopal had then said.