Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud on Wednesday lost his cool while refusing to entertain submissions seeking early setting up of a fresh bench to hear Bilkis Bano’s plea challenging the remission granted by the Gujarat government to 11 men convicted of gang-raping her and killing seven of her family members.

“Madam, the writ will be listed. Please do not keep mentioning the same thing again and again. It is very irritating. Don’t keep on mentioning this matter all the time. Every day you mention the same matter,” Justice Chandrachud told advocate Shobha Gupta, appearing for Bilkis who is a victim of the 2002 Gujarat riots.

On Tuesday, Justice Bela M. Trivedi, a judge from Gujarat, had recused from hearing the writ petition filed by Bilkis challenging the premature release of the 11 convicts. Justice Trivedi had not cited any reason.

CJI Chandrachud was sitting with Justice P.S. Narasimha during the morning mentioning time on Wednesday when advocate Gupta had made the request for swift setting up of a fresh bench.

Like his predecessor Justice U.U. Lalit, Justice Chandrachud is known for being composed and unruffled during hearings. Advocate Gupta had twice earlier made requests before the bench for early listing of the two petitions filed by Bilkis.

Bilkis had, in addition to the writ petition, filed a plea seeking a review of the apex court’s May 13 order by which it had asked the Gujarat government to consider the plea for remission of the 11 life convicts.

The review petition was listed before the bench of Justices Rastogi and Vikram Nath at 1.30pm on Tuesday, in chambers. However, the outcome is not known as an official order has not yet been uploaded till Wednesday evening.

A review petition has to be heard by the same bench which had passed the original order. In Bilkis’s case, the bench of Justices Rastogi and Nath had passed the impugned order of May 13, directing the Gujarat government to consider the plea for premature release of one of the convicts, Radheshyam Bhagwandas Shah alias Lala Vakil.

Radheshyam had moved the apex court after Gujarat High Court had ruled that only the Maharashtra government had the power to consider release of the convicts since the trial was conducted in that state.

Earlier on September 9, the apex court had sought the response of the 11 life convicts whose premature release had ignited outrage among civil liberties activists.

However, at that time during the hearing of the matter by the bench of Justices Rastogi and Nagarathna, some of the convicts through advocate Rishi Malhotra had questioned the locus standi of the PIL petitioners — CPI leader Subhashini Ali along with two others and Trinamul parliamentarian Mohua Moitra — in seeking cancellation of the premature release on the ground that the petitioners were not the victims.

It was in this context Bilkis had filed the two petitions.