‘Wild witch hunt’: HC rejects plea seeking CBI probe into unaccounted cash at Justice Varma home

The Delhi High Court on Monday rejected a petition seeking the registration of a first information report and a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation or a Special Investigation Team into the recovery of unaccounted cash from former Allahabad High Court judge Yashwant Varma’s residence, Live Law reported.

“This is a wild witch hunt,” said Justice Amit Bansal. He was quoted as having asked the petitioner, an advocate, if he had “nothing better to do”.

Unaccounted cash was allegedly recovered at Varma’s official residence in Delhi when emergency services responded to a fire there in March 2025. He was a judge at the Delhi High Court at that time.

The judge said that he was in Bhopal when the cash was discovered and claimed that it did not belong to him or his family.

The controversy prompted his transfer to the Allahabad High Court.

In April, he resigned from his post, more than two months after Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the process to impeach the judge was underway.

Three months later, an inquiry committee formed by the Lok Sabha said in August that all the charges framed against Varma were proved. It noted that “unexplained bundles of Rs 500” were recovered from his Delhi home and that he had given misleading explanations about it.

The petitioner, Ghanshyam Dayalu Upadhyay, had moved...

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