Court No. - 5
Case :- WRIT - B No. - 3615 of 2018 Petitioner :- Jagdev Singh And 7 Others Respondent :- Ddc Bijnor And 12 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Anup Swaroop Srivastava Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.
Hon'ble Pradeep Kumar Singh Baghel,J.
The petitioners have preferred this writ petition for the following relief:
"1. Issue a writ, order or direction in the nature of mandamus directing the respondents to consider and decide the stay application filed in support of Revision filed by the petitioners before the Deputy Director of Consolidation, Bijnor being numbered as Revision No. 473 of 2017 (Jagdev Singh Vs. Urmila Devi and others) under Section 48(1) of U.P. Consolidation of Holdings Act."
The issue whether a writ of Mandamus can be issued has been considered by a Division Bench of this Court in the case of Ali Shad Usmani and others v. Ali Isteba and others, 2015 (2) ADJ 250 (DB), wherein the Court has held as under:
"2. We are not inclined to issue a direction for the expeditious hearing of a Civil Suit which is pending before the Civil Judge (Junior Division), District-Azamgarh. It would be most inappropriate to Court to entertain a writ petition under Article 226 and/or under Article 227 of the Constitution simply for the purpose of expediting the hearing of a suit. Such orders, if granted, place a class of litigants, who move the Court in a separate and preferential category whereas other cases which may be of similar or greater antiquity and urgency are left to be decided in the normal channel. Hence, any such direction may be issued with the greatest care and circumspection by the High Court otherwise the Civil Courts will be overburdened only with requests for expeditious disposal of suits, which have been expedited by the High Court. Most of the litigants cannot afford the expense of moving the High Court and would not, therefore, be in a position to have the benefit of such an order.
3. Ultimately, it must be left to the judicious exercise of discretion of the concerned Court to determine whether a ground for urgency has been made out. We emphasize that there may be other cases such as involving senior citizens, those who are differently abled or people suffering from a particular disabililty socio-economic or otherwise which may prime cause of urgent disposal. It is for the learned Trial Judge in each case to apply his or her mind and decide whether the hearing of the suit to be expedited."
In a writ petition being Writ-B No. 3569 of 2018 (Dashrath v. Board of Revenue, Uttar Pradesh & others) this Court has held that the principle held in Ali Shad Usmani (supra) can be safely applied to the Revenue Courts and other Administrative Tribunals also.
In the present case the petitioner has sought prayer to decide the stay application. In my view it is a frivolous writ petition. The Supreme Court in the case of Phool Chandra and another v. State of Uttar Pradesh, (2014) 13 SCC 112 has held that the High Courts should curb the tendency of filing frivolous writ petitions by imposing heavy costs on the petitioners and the advocates too. Relevant part of the judgment in Phool Chandra (supra) is extracted below:
"12. All these are aberrations in the functioning of the Apex Court of any country. Of late, there has been an increase in the trend of litigants rushing to the courts, including this Court, for all kinds of trivial and silly matters which results in wastage of public money and time. A closer scrutiny of all such matters would disclose that there was not even a remote justification for filing the case. It is a pity that the time of the court which is becoming acutely precious because of the piling arrears has to be wasted on hearing such matters. There is an urgent need to put a check on such frivolous litigation. Perhaps many such cases can be avoided if the learned counsel who are officers of the court and who are expected to assist the court tender proper advice to their clients. The Bar has to realise that the great burden upon the Bench of dispensing justice imposes a simultaneous duty upon them to share this burden and it is their duty to see that the burden should not needlessly be made unbearable. The Judges of this Nation are struggling bravely against the odds to tackle the problem of dispensing quick justice. But, without the cooperation of the gentlemen of the Bar, nothing can be done.
13. It is high time that the courts should come down heavily upon such frivolous litigation and unless we ensure that the wrongdoers are denied profit or undue benefit from the frivolous litigation, it would be difficult to control frivolous and uncalled for litigation. In order to curb such kind of litigation, the courts have to ensure that there is no incentive or motive which can be ensured by imposing exemplary costs upon the parties as well as on the learned counsel who act in an irresponsible manner. {Vide Varinderpal Singh v. M.R. Sharma, 1986 Supp SCC 719, Ramrameshwari Devi v. Nirmala Devi, (2011) 8 SCC 249 : (2011) 4 SCC (Civ) 1, and Gurgaon Gramin Bank v. Khazani, (2012) 8 SCC 781 : AIR 2012 SC 2881.}"
(emphasis supplied) Applying the said law in the present writ petition, I find that the writ petition is liable to be dismissed with heavy costs. However, having regard to the fact that the petitioners are agriculturist the Court desist to impose costs.
The writ petition is accordingly dismissed.
Order Date :- 24.4.2018 Digamber