No Special Bench without hearing the parties:
Laying down that even such purely ad-hominem circumstances, the President is not obliged to give an opportunity to the concerned parties and pass unreasoned orders, will be conferring a non-transparent and uncorrectable power on the President. In such circumstances, in our opinion, it is in the interest of administration of justice that the President should give an opportunity of hearing to both the parties before referring the matter to a special bench.
Laying down such proposition will neither open floodgates of litigation nor place unnecessary burden on the President. During the course of hearing, which went over several adjourned dates, we had called upon Registry of the Tribunal to furnish data as to instances of exercise of power by the President in such circumstances i.e. on an application of a party to the litigation, in a seized matter the entire appeal has been referred to special bench. No such data was furnished nor was any explanation given for non- furnishing. We were informed that in some matters entire appeal is referred but we were not informed whether other two ingredients were present. We proceed to presume therefore that the case at hand is the only of its kind. In any case, it does not seem to be a regular practice of the Tribunal and it certainly is a deviation.
The President entertained a request in a matter which was seized by the Regular Bench, from a party to the litigation, passed an order without hearing the other side, without any reasons, and posted the entire matter before the special bench. This course of action was in breach of principles of natural justice and lacking in fairness.