Senior Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge told The Indian Express on Thursday that the party would not move an impeachment motion in Parliament against Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra.

The Congress was reportedly leading efforts to collect the signatures of Opposition leaders in the Rajya Sabha to enlist their support for an attempt to start impeachment proceedings against Misra. An impeachment motion in the Upper House requires the signatures of at least 50 members, and the Congress had reportedly collected 60.

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The Times of India had reported that party leaders, on Thursday, had met legal experts in the office of Ghulam Nabi Azad, the leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, to discuss the proposed impeachment motion. The report said that the matter had also been discussed with other Opposition parties.

“No, that issue is closed now,” Kharge told The Indian Express when asked about the impeachment motion. “Because there is no question now. And we never initiated [it] in the Lower House. There was a talk in the Upper House, but I think that they have also not taken this issue.”

Both the Congress and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) had said that they were considering impeachment proceedings against Misra after four senior Supreme Court judges, at a press conference on January 11, raised questions about the way he allocates cases. They had said that their attempts to get Misra “to take steps to protect the institution” of the Supreme Court had gone unaddressed.

The Congress was initially reluctant about the impeachment motion, with former Law Ministers M Veerappa Moily and Ashwani Kumar speaking out against the move. It, however, changed its mind after a section of the party and Opposition parties such as the CPI(M) and the Nationalist Congress Party pushed it to start collecting signatures.