New Delhi:Seeking to put a lid on a controversy, former Supreme Court Chief Justice R C Lahoti today said he had never made any comments against his predecessor V N Khare on handling the issue of judges of the Punjab and Haryana High Court going on protest leave a couple of years ago.

"Terming media reports in this regard as distorted, blown out of proportion and regrettable," Lahoti said his remarks were limited to the situation prevailing in the court then and was not laying blame on anyone for that.

Twenty-five judges of Punjab and Haryana high court had gone on mass leave for one day on April 18, 2005 in protest against alleged "high-handedness" of the then Chief Justice B K Roy.

Quoting Lahoti, the newspaper reports suggested his appeals to Khare, then Chief Justice of India, to intervene were ignored till the matter came to a head and judges went on one-day mass leave, something unprecedented in the Indian judicial history.

Justice Khare, who could not be reached for comments, had reportedly expressed resentment over the purported remarks, saying some disgruntled judges were behind this.

Speaking to sources Lahoti said "A few days ago, I had gone to deliver a convocation address in an engineering institute in Chandigarh. When it was over, a correspondent of local English daily asked me about something that had happened about two years ago regarding the judges of Punjab and Haryana high court who had gone on mass casual leave for one day."