Biography of Justice D P Wadhwa

June 6, 2022

Justice D P Wadhwa was born on 5^th May, 1935. His father’s name was Devinder Pratap. He pursued B.Sc. L.L.B. He enrolled as a pleader in 1958 in the Punjab High Court and started his practice in Delhi and became Advocate in 1962. In April, 1980 he was appointed Central Government Standing Counsel for Delhi High Court. After that he was appointed Additional Judge, Delhi High Court from 12^th August, 1983 and appointed permanent Judge on 23^rd Feburary, 1984. On 29^th September,1984, he appointed Chief Justice Patna High Court. Appointed as a judge of Supreme Court of India. And retired on 5^th May, 2000.

landmark judgement given by the Justice D P Wadhwa

In the case of the former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, State Of Tamil Nadu Through … vs Nalini And 25 Others on 11 May, 1999, Wadhwa, J. took the view that confession of an accused is a substantive evidence against himself as well as against co-accused, abettor or conspirator. On consideration of all the aforementioned confessions and other evidence against the appellants confirmed conviction of only A-1, A-2, A-3 and A-18 under Section 120- B read with Section 302 I.P.C. and confirmed death sentence of all of them while acquitting all other appellants.

Justice D P Wadhwa Committee on Public distribution system and charter

The Public Distribution System (PDS) of the country has not yielded benefit to the extent intended due to corrupt implementing machinery. This was the observation of the Wadhwa Committee, which has recommended a slew of measures to make the system robust and bring transparency to it.

The committee, headed by former Supreme Court judge D P Wadhwa, was set up in 2006 following an order by the apex court, which was hearing a petition by People’s Union for Civil Liberties, a human rights organisation. The committee was assisted by N C Saxena, commissioner of the Supreme Court on right to food. Taking the committee’s report on board, a bench of apex court has asked states to respond to the report.

Collusion between persons involved in the PDS supply chain, from fair price shop dealers, responsible for distribution of food grain at the grassroots level, to transporters, bureaucrats and politicians, is resulting in leakage of food grains the report says.
The committee has recommended adoption of modern technology, for instance computerisation of PDS beneficiaries, to bring transparency to the system. Besides, it says, private individuals should not be allowed to operate fair price shops and that these be phased out. Their place should be taken over by state-level corporations, panchayati raj institutions or registered self-help groups. This will help check pilferage in PDS.

To monitor the system, the committee recommends formation of a Civil Supply Corporation at the state level. As of now there are many vigilance committees to monitor the distribution of foodgrains but they are almost defunct. There is no check on the foodgrains supplied to the state by the Food Corporation of India or brought by fair price shop dealers for distribution to people below the poverty line (BPL).

The committee recommends a clear division of responsibility between the Centre and states. While the Centre should be responsible for procurement, storage, transportation and bulk allocation of foodgrains under PDS, states should bear the operational responsibilities such as allocations to fair price shops, identification of below poverty line families, issuing of ration cards and supervision and monitoring of functioning of fair price shops.

Universalising PDS

In a step towards the universalisation of PDS, the committee recommends doing away with APL (above poverty line) list, meaning everyone should be entitled to PDS.

However, as immediate measures, the committee has asked the Centre to increase storage capacity, ensure timely supply of food grains, monitor fair price shops and set up complaint redressal system at the grassroots level. Reiterating two Supreme Court orders, passed in connection to the right to food case, the report recommends cancellation of the licence of fair price shop dealers who are found involved in malpractices like selling the foodgrains in the black market, not providing foodgrains to BPL families at the government-prescribed rate, making false entries and not keeping the shop open during the stipulated time period.

It also directs the Centre to include under Antyodaya Anna Yojana the aged, infirm, destitute men and women, including lactating mothers, widows and other single women with no assured support, old persons above 60 with no assured support, disabled adults, primitive tribes and households which has no adult members to ensure food security.

Justice D P Wadhwa committee on IPO

SEBI had investigated certain irregularities in Initial Public Offerings (IPO) from the year 2005 and constituted a Committee under the chairmanship of Justice D P Wadhwa, Chairman (Former Judge, Supreme Court of India) and four other members (representing investor associations, Registrars to the issues, merchant bankers and SEBI) to advise/recommend the procedure of identification of persons who might have been deprived on account of such IPO irregularities and the manner in which reallocation of shares to such take place.

On December 12, 2007, Justice Wadhwa committee submitted its report to SEBI. The Committee enunciated three principles in its report, as under:

Quantification of the amount of unjust enrichment: The number of shares allotted of afferent applicants shall be treated as unjust allotments/enrichment.
Identification of “deprived” applicants: The totally unsuccessful applicants shall have the first call on the reallocation. These applicants will be considered for the amount which is the difference of closing price of shares on the first day of listing/trading at NSE and IPO issue price.
Basis for re-allocation amongst deprived applicants: The totally unsuccessful applicants shall be reallocated money value as computed above from recovered unjust gains, till they each receive the gains associated with minimum shares allotted to the lowest category in the IPO.

SEBI had initiated proceedings against certain key operators and financiers involved in the IPO irregularities to penalize them and disgorge the ill-gotten gains these key operators had made. SEBI has been successful in disgorging a part of the gains that such entities have made. SEBI has been successful in disgorging a part of gains that such entities have made. It intends to continue its efforts to disgorge further sums in future on completing the legal/consent proceedings currently in progress. In the interim, SEBI proposes to initiate administrative steps for reallocation of the amount it has collected. In this context, the Justice D P Wadhwa committee Report is placed in the public domain for information.

Member of INSOL

INSOL India was conceived on September 27,1997 at a get together of lawyers and judges hosted by Arun Jaitley, Senior Advocate, presently, Union Minister of Finance, Defence and Corporate Affairs at the instance of Justice D.P. Wadhwa, the then Judge, Supreme Court of India. Justice Wadhwa was the only member of INSOL International from India at that time. A committee comprising of Arun Jaitley and Sumant Batra drafted the Charter of INSOL India setting down, amongst others, the aims and objectives of INSOL India, the categories and eligibility criteria of membership. Justice Manmohan Sarin, then a Judge of High Court of Delhi was unanimously nominated as the first President of INSOL India and Sumant Batra as the Founder Secretary of INSOL India.

The task of negotiating the terms of membership of INSOL India with INSOL International and the use of word `INSOL’ in the name of the association was successfully achieved under the leadership of Justice Wadhwa and Justice Sarin supported by Mr. Sumant Batra. The matter was taken up with the then President of INSOL International, Mr. R. Gordon Marantz, Q.C. Later on Mr. Richard C Turton, Past President of INSOL International and Miss Claire Broughton, Executive Director of INSOL International met Mr. Sumant Batra in 1998 to discuss the various modalities of membership and how the two Associations could be of mutual benefit to each other. Justice Wadhwa and Justice Sarin discussed the matter further with them at Auckland conference. INSOL India finally became the member of INSOL International in August 1999.

The formation of INSOL India fulfilled the long cherished desire of the members of the legal fraternity, chartered accountants, company secretaries and other persons, bodies and institutions in India, to have an association to promote closer co-operation, exchange of ideas, dissemination of information and an empathetic understanding of law of insolvency and related laws.

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June 6, 2022