What is Not before me?

The Hyderabad High Court Bench on Monday struck down a plea by the Stephenson in the”not before” case. The court ruled that that the case would continue to be heard by the same Bench. Earlier, the nominated MLA had prayed to the court for transferring the petition case filed by Jerusalem Mathiah in the cash-for-vote case to another Bench.

What is a ‘not before’ case? This is an expression used in common parlance for requesting a judge to withdraw from hearing case before a specific judge. Often the various cases filed before the court are distributed for hearing by the Chief Justice. The division is done subject wise like civil cases, criminal appeals, writ petitions PIL cases, writ appeals, etc.

A practice that has gained currency is that a party may require for stated reasons that the judge not hear a particular case and recuse himself from adjudicating the controversy. Sometimes the judges themselves address a communication to the Registry that certain cases, more particularly those filed by certain advocates are not listed before them.

These are invariably of those who are the kith and kin of the judges or those who have been the juniors of the said judges when they were at the Bar. Sometimes parties invent reasons to avoid a particular judge and seek a “not before” of a case. A common known strategy in this regard is to engage a particular advocate who is listed by the Registry as ‘not before’ a particular judge and have him file his vakalat. In such a situation the case goes before some other judge.