New Delhi: Chief Justice of India V N Khare could not sleep for many days when reports were published in newspapers linking three Karnataka High Court Judges to the alleged Mysore sex scandal last year.

While expressing deep anguish over the manner in which media linked the judges to the scandal without any basis, the Chief Justice said, "I could not sleep for many days. I was so disturbed".

These observations came during the hearing of a bunch of petitions challenging contempt proceedings initiated by the Karnataka High Court against 11 publications for "scandalising the judiciary" while reporting the incident without basis.

A high-level judicial panel headed by Bombay High Court Chief Justice recently in its report to the Chief Justice gave clean chit to the three judges and said that none of the correspondents could give any basis for linking the judges to the scandal.

Speaking for himself, the Chief Justice said that "truth is a defence in contempt matters" but someone should come out with the truth. "I am anguished that the media has behaved totally irresponsibly," he added.

"Are these people ready to come out with the truth? I will ask the Judges to quit if they do so," the CJI said throwing a challenge to the media to come out with the whole story.

PTI