Vijaya Kamlesh Tahilramani (born 3 October 1958) is a former Indian judge and prosecutor, who last served as the chief justice of the Madras High Court.
[3][4] During her tenure at the Bombay High Court, Tahilramani notably rejected appeals and affirmed the conviction of persons accused in the 2002 Bilkis Bano case, in which a 19 year old pregnant Muslim woman was gang-raped during the 2002 Gujarat riots.
[5] In 2018, Tahilramani also declined a request from Devendra Fadnavis, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party and then the Chief Minister of Maharashtra, to head an inquiry into the 2018 Bhima Koregaon incident, on the grounds that as a sitting judge of the High Court, it would be inappropriate for her to accept the government appointment.
Notably one such case in which she instructed contempt proceedings to continue was against H. Raja, national secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party, who had made several allegations against judges of the court after he was denied permission to create a structure for religious worship in a public place.
[23] Dravidar Kazhagam president K. Veeramani stated that Tahilramani's resignation demonstrated "self-respect," calling for a re-evaluation of judicial administration to increase transparency in transfers.
[24] Former Supreme Court judge Madan Lokur wrote that the transfer was " ex facie suggestive of humiliation" and praised her decision to resign instead.
[29] On 30 September 2019, after Tahilramani's resignation, the Intelligence Bureau submitted a report based on which the then-Supreme Court Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi directed an investigation into Tahilramani for allegations of corruption relating to the purchase of properties and the dissolution of the bench hearing cases concerning idol thefts.
[32] In a memoir published after his retirement, Justice Gogoi, explained that he took the decision to transfer Tahilramani to a court "where there was less work" after he felt there were credible allegations concerning irregularities, against her.