Lucknow, Dec. 3: Behind the Supreme Court’s “uncle judge” barb last week lies an Allahabad High Court verdict favouring a circus owner accused of detaining and raping young Nepalese girls.

Raja Khan, who roams about with armed “guards” accused of murder, wanted to set up his circus tent on a dargah’s grounds for a month in June. When the dargah’s custodian, the Sunni Central Wakf Board, refused permission citing the criminal cases against him, Khan moved the Lucknow bench of the high court.

A division bench threw out his petition on May 28 and then rejected his review plea too. Khan should then have appealed to the Supreme Court, but he didn’t.

Instead, he filed a new writ petition before the Allahabad High Court bench of Justice Rakesh Sharma, who had just days left before he retired.

The single-judge bench granted his plea, despite the division bench being a higher authority and despite the territorial jurisdiction over Bahraich — 130km from Lucknow — belonging to the Lucknow bench.

Justice Sharma’s order was the provocation for the Supreme Court to speak of “something rotten” in Allahabad High Court and slam its “uncle judges” for favouring clients of lawyers related to them.

Khan’s lawyer was not related to Justice Sharma, whose son practises law before the Lucknow bench.

Justice Sharma’s “ex parte” order — passed without hearing the wakf board —“came as a shock”, said Samsad Ahmad, vice-president of the board’s managing committee in Bahraich and an advocate himself.

The wakf board was particularly reluctant to have anything to do with Khan because his feared “guards” are accused of shooting a shopkeeper dead in Bahraich after a quarrel. The case is pending.

Khan is also charged with detaining six Nepalese girls in his tent in Gonda in 2004 after promising them jobs, two of whom accused him before TV cameras of raping them. The circus owner is out on bail while the trial drags on.

A few years ago, Khan and his guards beat up journalists and child rights activists when they went to his tent in Basti, accompanying a group of Nepalese parents who alleged he was detaining their minor daughters.

Punit Gupta, the wakf board’s lawyer, said Khan “hid the orders of the division bench from Justice Sharma”.

The judge’s first order, dated June 11, asked the Bahraich district administration to allot the land to Khan within three days.

When the allotment was not made, he passed a second order on June 18 directing the administration to implement his previous order. Justice Sharma retired on July 5.

The wakf board approached a division bench of Allahabad High Court which reversed Justice Sharma’s order. On August 5, the division bench asked Khan to pay the court Rs 50,000 for wasting its time and another Rs 50,000 to the wakf board.

“However, the circus company was refusing to make the payment. So we approached the Supreme Court,” Ahmad said.

On November 26, the top court bench of Justice Markandey Katju and Justice Gyan Sudha Mishra made the now-famous observation about “uncle judges”.

Atiq Ahmad, a spokesperson for Khan, said: “The circus owner is not at fault. He is a victim of conspiracy.”

Sources said the Allahabad High Court’s chief justice had called a meeting to take strong measures to stop the “uncle judge syndrome”, as advised by the top court bench.

The high court bar association — a private body of lawyers — however, plans to move the Supreme Court asking it to delete the remarks about the high court.