LUCKNOW: Perturbed with unpleasant situation caused in Congress MP Rahul Gandhi’s dual citizenship case, Justice Subhash Vidyarthi of Lucknow bench of Allahabad high court on Monday recused himself from hearing of the case and requested the chief justice to constitute another bench. On Monday, Justice Vidyarthi was particularly peeved by the social media posts of petitioner S Shishir Vignesh after his previous order.Justice Vidyarthi , however, admitted that he should have issued notice to Rahul Gandhi in the case before dictating filing of an FIR on April 17, 2026 in an open court . He also chastised the lawyers of all the parties for not placing before him the correct legal position as to whether the proposed accused was required to be heard.Hearing a plea from of a Karnataka BJP worker, Justice Vidyarthi on April 17, 2026 had dictated an order in open court , directing Uttar Pradesh police to register an FIR against Rahul in case of alleged double citizenship controversy.However, when the order came to be uploaded on high court’s website on April on April 18, 2026 , it stated that before the order was typed and signed , the judge came to know that in a leading verdict of the Allahabad high court, it was mandatory to issue notice to the proposed accused , in this case Gandhi, before delivery any judgment on the issue.The judge had, thereafter, instead of signing the order, posted the matter for further hearing on April 20 on question of issuance of notice to Gandhi. In its order passed on Monday, the judge clarified that it was mandatory to issue notice to Gandhi prior to passing any order in the case.The judge was specially peeved by the social media posts made by the petitioner, S Shishir Vignesh. “The messages posted by the petitioner on social media after passing of the order on April 17 amount to casting aspersions on this court and keeping those in consideration, I find it appropriate to recuse from hearing this case”, said Justice Vidyarthi.Expressing annoyance that proper legal assistance was not given to him by informing that issuance of notice to proposed accused was necessary, Justice Vidyarthi observed, “ I am pained to note that the lawyers appearing in this case have failed to perform their duty of providing assistance to the Court in a fair manner.”
