Slapping a Rs.One lakh penalty on two advocates, the Supreme Court today dimissed their petition challenging the appointment of Justice N V Ramana as a judge of Andhra Pradesh High Court, saying it was a "ruse to malign" him.

In their PIL, the advocates contested Ramana's appointment on the ground that a criminal case was pending against him at the time of his elevation to the bench.

The apex court held that there was no suppression of facts by Justice Ramana about the case and no one including the Judge himself was aware of the pendency of the case at the time of his elevation and the PIL against him was aimed at showing him in bad light.

Imposing the cost on the advocates, a bench headed by Justice Aftab Alam said, "it is equally important to protect the court from uncalled for attacks and the individual judges from unjust infliction of injuries".

"From all the attending circumstances, it is clear beyond doubt that not only respondent No 3 (Justice Ramana) himself but practically no one was aware of the pendency of the case in which he was named as an accused," the bench said after going through all records of the case of rioting and destruction of public property in 1981 when he was a student of Nagarjuna University in Andhra Pradesh.

The bench, after going through records of his appointment and clearance given by the Centre, IB and collegium of High Court and the Supreme Court for his elevation as Judge, came to the conclusion that there is no deliberate and conscious suppression of material fact by the judge.

"We have carefully gone through the record relating to his appointment as a judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court. From the record it is evident that none of the members of the High Court or the Supreme Court Collegia was aware of the fact. The State Government was equally unaware of the fact and so was the Central Government as is evident from the resume prepared by the Law Ministry as also the IB Report," it said.

The bench said that the petition was filed against the Judge on the basis of incorrect facts and to malign him.

"The report is based on incorrect facts and is full of statements and innuendos that might easily constitute the offence of defamation leave alone contempt of court," the bench said.

"It, therefore, appears to us that this writ petition is not a sincere and honest endeavour to correct something which the petitioners truly perceive to be wrong but the real intent of this petition is to malign the Judge," it said.

The bench said that M Manohar Reddy along with other petitioner presented the facts of the criminal case in a twisted manner to malign the Judge.

"After the news broke out, the petitioners seem to have collected the record of the criminal case and filed this writ petition on that basis. The writ petition is drafted with some skill and it presents the facts of the criminal case in a rather twisted way in an attempt to portray the Judge in bad light," the bench said.

"The way the writ petition is drafted shows that the petitioners are competent and experienced counsel. Had they examined the records of the criminal case objectively and honestly, there was no reason for them not to come to the same conclusion as arrived at in this judgement or as appearing from the report of the Chief Justice, Andhra Pradesh High Court," the bench said.

Justice Ramana was elevated as permanent judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court on June 27, 2000.