MV Jayarajan to be released on Wednesday

Tuesday, 15 November 2011: The CPM leader MV Jayarajan, who was sentenced to six month’s imprisonment by the Kerala High Court in a contempt of Court case, will be released on Tuesday. The Supreme Court has today granted bail to MV Jayarajan.
A bench comprising of Justices R.M. Lodha and H.L. Gokhale accepted Jayarajan’s appeal and granted bail.The court also said that the High Court order that did not allow him to appeal was exceptional.
Jayarajan in his appeal had said that the High Court verdict was prejudiced and that he did not try to defame the judiciary. Taking a strong view of offensive remarks made against judges and the judiciary by Jayarajan, the Kerala High Court had sentenced him to six months imprisonment.
The division bench of the court had held that by making the offending speech at Kannur last year, Jayarajan was ridiculing in public, performance of two high court judges and making “scurrilous, offensive, vicious and malicious onslaught on the higher judiciary that too beyond controllable limits.”
The bench comprising justices V Ram Kumar and P Q Barkat Ali held Jayarajan, a former MLA from Kannur, guilty under sec 12 of the Contempt of Court Act and noted during the trial, he had gone to the press justifying his act, including using the word ’shumban’ (a derogatory term which in local parlance means a useless person) against the judges.
Jayarajan’s plea to suspend the sentence to enable him to file appeal in the Supreme Court was turned down by the court.The High Court had last week sentenced Jayarajan to six months imprisonment and slapped a fine of Rs 2000 for his derogatory comments against two judges for the court verdict on banning roadside meetings.