The Congress party led a delegation of the Rajya Sabha Members of Parliament to Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu to give their presentation for the motion of impeachment against Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra. The petition was signed by 64 sitting MPs of the House and seven others who recently retired. The petition was rejected today.

The fact that the Congress took the initiative to impeach CJI Misra looked surprising given the political background of the administrative head of the Supreme Court. CJI Misra comes from a family of politicians who served the Congress since pre-Independence days.

CJI Dipak Misra's grandfather was a legendary freedom fighter and considered as one of the 'panchasakha' -- a group of five friends and activists who are considered the "five architects of modern Odisha". His name was Godabarish Misra (1886-1956). He started the Odisha chapter of the Congress in 1928.

The same year, Godabarish Misra took over as the editor of The Samaja, pre-Independence Odisha's pioneering daily. Later, CJI Dipak Misra's grandfather became the first education minister of Odisha in 1941 in the pre-­Independence council of ministers. CJI Dipak Misra studied in a school - Godabarish Vidyapith at Banpur - named after his grandfather.

Godabarish Misra had three sons. The eldest son was Loknath Misra, who was a prominent member of the Swatantra Party (founded by C Rajagopalachari in reaction to Jawaharlal Nehru's overbearing dominance in the Indian National Congress and his increasing socialist leaning). Later, Loknath Misra became a member of the Janata Party.

Loknath Misra was nominated to the Rajya Sabha more than once between 1960 and 1978. He also served as the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Assam between 1991 and 1997. The Congress was in power at the Centre between 1991 and 1996.

The second son of Godabarish Misra was Raghunath Misra. He was also with the Congress. He became a member of the Odisha Legislative Assembly from Banpur. CJI Dipak Misra is the son of Raghunath Misra.

The youngest son of Godabarish Misra was Rangnath Misra, who became the 21st Chief Justice of India in 1990 for 14-month tenure. Incidentally, Justice Dipak Misra also got a 14-month tenure as the CJI. He is due to retire on October 2 this year.

Before becoming a Supreme Court judge in 1983, Justice Rangnath Misra had served as judge in the Orissa High Court since 1969. He became the Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court in 1981. BJD Rajya Sabha MP and senior lawyer Pinaki Misra is the son of Rangnath Misra, who was also the first chairman of the National Commission for Human Rights (1993). PV Narsimha Rao was the prime minister when Justice Rangnath Misra was appointed NHRC chairman.

Among the charges levelled by the Congress-led delegation of the Rajya Sabha MPs is the allegation that CJI Dipak Misra acquired two acres of land in Odisha in 1979 on forged documents. The allotment of land was cancelled in 1985 by the district magistrate of Cuttack where he was practising as a lawyer.

The order for cancellation of land allocation could, however, only be implemented in 2012 when the matter reached the Orissa High Court. The high court ordered a CBI probe into the matter. The land allocated to CJI Dipak Misra allegedly fell under agricultural land category. The CBI submitted its report in the high court in May 2013.

While this land acquisition matter was still pending, CJI Dipak Misra was first elevated to the Orissa High Court as the additional judge in 1996. There was a Congress government both in Odisha in 1996 with JB Patnaik as the chief minister and at the Centre when Dipak Misra was elevated to Orissa High Court as an additional judge.

He was made the Madhya Pradesh High Court judge in 1997. There was a Congress government in Madhya Pradesh at the time and Digvijay Singh was the chief minister. The Congress was supporting a United Front government at the Centre when Justice Dipak Misra became a judge in the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

Dipak Misra's next assignment came as the Chief Justice of the Patna High Court in December, 2009 when the Congress led a UPA government which had won its second consecutive mandate about seven months ago. In Bihar, Nitish Kumar was the NDA chief minister.

In May 2010, he was made the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court. There was a Congress government both at the Centre and in Delhi. Justice Dipak Misra was elevated to the Supreme Court in October, 2011. Manmohan Singh was the prime minister at the time.

Before being appointed as the CJI, Justice Dipak Misra had an eventful career at the Supreme Court. He led the benches that heard the plea to stop 1993 blast convict Yakub Memon's hanging, awarded death penalty to Nirbhaya's rapists, ordered Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Congress president (then vice-president) Rahul Gandhi and BJP leader Subramanian Swamy to face criminal defamation trial and made playing the national anthem mandatory in movie theatres.

Justice Dipak Misra was chosen by the then CJI JS Khehar to lead the hearing of Ayodhya's Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute from August 11 last year. Incidentally, Congress leader and senior lawyer Kapil Sibal representing the Sunni Waqf Board argued before the bench to defer hearing of the matter till Lok Sabha elections next year.