JUDGMENT Imtiyaz Murtaza and R.N. Misra, JJ.
1. We have heard the petitioner in person. He is a practicing Advocate at Deoria. He prays to punish the contemnor Smt. Chandra Sheeha, Civil Judge (Senior Division) Deoria, Court No. 18, for allegedly committing criminal contempt.
2. The facts, shortly stated, are that he filed Suit No. 140 of 1990 (Upendra Mani Tripathi v. Cadila Leasing & Finance Co. (Pvt.) Ltd. and Ors.), against Cadila Leasing & Finance Company (Pvt) Ltd., Calcutta and two others for the recovery of Rs. 22,238/-50P which, according to him, represented the amount (with interest) overpaid by him to them relating to a contract entered into in April 1986 of hire purchase of a Jeep. The defendants allegedly played fraud on him by obtaining his signatures over about 100 unfilled and blank papers. He allegedly had no time or necessity to object to the said act of the defendants. The defendants allegedly received over payment of Rs. 18,033/- from him. For the recovery of the same (adding interest of Rs. 4205.50P), he instituted the suit in question for the total amount of Rs. 22,238/-50P. from the defendants. A copy of the plaint of the said suit No. 140 of 1990 has been filed by the petitioner as Annexure-1 to the supplementary affidavit.
3. The defendants did not file any written statement in the said suit. Instead, an application was made under Section 34 of the Arbitration Act. The said application was rejected.
4. However, the defendants obtained an order of stay dated 27.8.1993 (Annexure No. 5 to the Writ Petition), passed by Calcutta High Court, staying proceedings of suit No. 140 of 1990 pending in the court of Civil Judge (S.D.), Court No. 18, Deona, which was extended by order dated 6.9.1993. A transfer application had been made by the defendants in Calcutta High Court in the name of Glitter Leasing & Finance Company (Pvt.) Ltd., inter alia, titling the same as being under Clause 13 of the Letters Patent 1865. A copy of the application made to the Calcutta High Court is Annexure No. 9 to the Contempt Petition. Cadila Leasing and Finance Company (Pvt.) Ltd. Calcuta has been arrayed as defendant No. 1 by the petitioner in Suit No. 140 of 1990. The contention before the Calcutta High Court on behalf of the Glitter Leasing & Finance Co. (P) Ltd., formerly Cadila Leasing & Finance Company (P) Ltd., Calcutta, was that it was a company registered and incorporated under the Companies Act, carrying on business at Calcutta. The present petitioner was said to have purchased a Mahindra Jeep under the hire purchase agreement and an arbitration agreement was also executed between the parties on 2.8.1986. At that time, the company was carrying on business in the name and style of "Cadila Leasing and Finance Company (P) Ltd.".
5. One Cadila Laboratories Ltd. filed an application before the High Court at Calcutta against the Cadila Leasing and Finance Company (P) Ltd. for restraining it from using the name of 'Cadila'. The said application was registered as Suit No. 409 of 1989 and decreed on 20.12.1989. In pursuance of the decree and order passed in the said suit, the company-Cadila Leasing and Finance Co. (P) Ltd. made an application before the Registrar of Companies, Calcutta to change its name as "Glitter Leasing and Finance Company (P) Ltd.". The Registrar of Companies issued a fresh certificate of incorporation consequent on change of name on 17.2.1992. Then Glitter Leasing and Finance Co. (P) Ltd. (company in the changed name) moved an application before the Calcutta High Court to make an inventory about the jeep purchased by the present petitioner on hire purchase agreement, which was lying at Deoria (U.P.) and further prayed for appointment of receiver to make an inventory and thereafter to release the vehicle in favour of the hirer. The present petitioner, it was alleged, failed to complete the instalments in pursuance of the agreement. Arbitration proceedings were initiated against him and were pending disposal. Hire purchase agreement had been executed at Calcutta from within the jurisdiction of Calcutta High Court. The jeep was also delivered from Asansol, Burdwan within the jurisdiction of Calcutta High Court and the business was being carried on by the company at P-3, Madan Chatterjee Lane, Calcutta (the same is the address of the defendant company mentioned by the present petitioner in the plaint of his suit No. 140 of 1990). The present petitioner, it was contended before the Calcutta High Court, in order to avoid payment of instalments in the manner as agreed upon between the parties, instituted the Original Suit No. 140 of 1990 at Deoria, to make the dispute sub judice, avoiding jurisdiction of the appropriate court, which action was allegedly mala fide and motivated by the design to evade payment of instalments due. We have culled out all these details from Annexure No. 9 to the contempt petition which is the copy of the application made by Glitter Leasing and Finance Co. (P) Ltd. before the Calcutta High Court in which the order in question referred to above was passed.
6. Annexure-2 to the supplementary affidavit is an order dated 7.10.1994 passed by another Division Bench of this Court in Criminal Contempt Application No. 559 of 1994 moved by the present petitioner with relation to the same matter. The criminal contempt application made by the petitioner was rejected with the specific finding that no case for proceeding under the Contempt of Courts Act was made out. However, it was left open to the petitioner to approach the District Judge as well as Civil Judge concerned by making fresh application praying for vacating the stay order on such grounds as he could be advised and the Civil Judge was to decide the same expeditiously.
7. Now, the grievance of the petitioner in these contempt proceedings is that after the order dated 7.10.1994 passed by a Division Bench of this Court in Criminal Contempt Application No. 559 of 1994 referred to above, despite his objection dated 327-C dated 19.9.2005 (Annexure 2 to the Contempt Petition), against application 134-C dated 2.9.1993 of defendant No. 1 (Annexure 1 to the Contempt Petition), the respondent Civil Judge (S.D.), Court No. 18, Deoria did not accede to his prayer for ignoring the stay order of the Calcuta High Court, holding that the proceedings of the case would continue to be stayed (as per the order of the Calcutta High Court). The contention of the petitioner is that the Calcutta High Court had no jurisdiction to pass stay order of the suit pending in Civil Court, Deoria and the court below was bound to ignore the stay order and to proceed with the suit. The petitioner, appearing in person, has argued that by her act, the respondent--Civil Judge (S.D.) has committed criminal contempt as defined under Section 2 of the Contempt of Courts Act 1971 as she has interfered with the due course of judicial proceedings.
8. We have carefully considered the matter. To initiate these criminal proceedings against the respondent, the petitioner has not sought the consent in writing of the Advocate General. When pointedly asked by us in this behalf, he referred to a case--Board of Revenue, U.P. Lucknow v. Vinay Chandra Misra . He urged that this Court should take suo motu cognizance of this criminal contempt allegedly committed by the respondent. He insisted that suo motu cognizance by the High Court is permissible as per the said case law in which it has been held that if the High Court is directly moved by a petition by a private person feeling aggrieved (not being the Advocate General), the High Court has in such a situation, a discretion to refuse to entertain the petition or to take cognizance on its own motion on the basis of the information supplied to it in the petition. It is significant to point out that it has also been laid down by the Supreme Court through the said decision that this mode of taking suo motu cognizance of contempt of a subordinate court should be resorted to sparingly where the contempt concerned is of a grave and serious nature. We are definitely of the opinion that the prayer of the petitioner is not worth that in view of the facts emerging on record as detailed above.
9. Another ruling cited by the petitioner is Brahma Prakash Sharma and Ors. v. State of U.P. and Ors. , in which it has been held that summary jurisdiction exercised by the superior courts in punishing contempt of their authority exists for the purpose of preventing interference with the course of justice and for maintaining the authority of law as is administered in the courts. There can be no quarrel with this proposition, but the point of the matter is that in the instant case, the respondent Civil Judge (S.D.) did not commit any contempt, what to say of criminal contempt by her act complained of by the petitioner.
10. The attempt of the petitioner to back his contempt petition by the order dated 7.10.1994, passed by a Division Bench of this Court in Criminal Contempt Petition No. 559 of 1994 is also misplaced. The earlier Division Bench rejected the criminal contempt application founded on the same premise of the proceedings of O.S. No. 140 of 1990 having been stayed by the court below on the basis of the stay order passed by Calcutta High Court. The Court gave specific finding that no case for contempt under the Contempt of Courts Act was made out. The earlier order dated 7.10.1994 could not be interpreted to be a direction to the lower court to accede to the prayer of the petitioner. The petitioner did again object to the continuance of the stay order, but the lower court on consideration of the matter, held by order dated 25.11.2005 that the suit could not be proceeded with so long the stay order passed by the Calcutta High Court was in existence. It is wholly imaginary on the part of the petitioner to insist that the respondent has committed criminal contempt.
11. To come to the point, the initiation of instant criminal contempt proceedings suffer for want of consent of Advocate General. That apart, as we said, the mater is not at all worth for taking suo motu cognizance in view of what we have detailed above.
12. We should also point out that the petitioner never moved Calcutta High Court for the vacation, review or modification of the stay order passed by that Court by making his submissions in the pending matter in which he figured as opposite party. As would appear from the discussion made by us earlier, the impugned stay order was passed by the Calcutta High Court on an application of Glitter leasing and Finance Co. (P) Ltd. which was the changed name of erstwhile Cadila Leasing and Finance Co. (P) Ltd., Calcutta. The stay order was seemingly passed relating to Company matter pending there. The Company did have its registered office at Calcutta within the jurisdiction of Calcutta High Court (as mentioned by the present petitioner also in the title of his plaint of suit No. 140 of 1990) The jeep had also been taken possession of by the present petitioner from Asansol, Burdwan as mentioned in paragraph 4 of the plaint. So, the right course for the petitioner could be to have approached the Calcutta High Court for vacation or modification of the said stay order instead of unnecessarily insisting and embarrassing the respondent to ignore the same. He did not do anything of the kind. To multiply the mischief, the petitioner had the temerity to file this petition to invoke the criminal contempt jurisdiction of this Court.
13. As a matter of fact, the respondent was duty-bound to take note of the stay granted by the Calcutta High Court in the matter pending there relating to defendant company. The Presiding Officer of the lower court abided by judicial discipline in rightly obeying the stay order passed by the Calcutta High Court. The object of law of contempt is to maintain public confidence in the administration of justice and it cannot be used by a party for self aggrandizement or to vindicate his vanity. Nor is it meant to be employed by a party to harass his adversary or embarrass the Presiding Officer of a court. The petitioner, a law knowing person being a practicing lawyer, has grossly abused and misused the process of the Court by seeking to invoke criminal contempt jurisdiction against the Presiding Officer of a court on wholly flimsy and untenable grounds, seemingly to demonstrate his nuisance propensities. He has wasted the precious time of this Court. Such a tendency is highly depreciable and is to be curbed with a strong hand. It is a fit case where exemplary costs must be imposed on the petitioner.
14. Resultantly, we dismiss the criminal contempt petition imposing special costs of Rs. 25,000/- (Rupees Twenty Five Thousand only) on him. The said amount shall be deposited by the petitioner (Upendra Mani Tripathi, S/o Sri Rajendra Mani Tripathi, Advocate, Civil Courts at Deoria, District Deoria, R/o Tenduhi, Tappa Dhatura, Pargana Silhat, Post Bardgunia, District Deoria) with the High Court Legal Services Committee, High Court, Allahabad within one month from today. In case of default on his part in payment of the same, the same shall be recovered from him as arrears of land revenue.
15. A copy of this order be supplied within three days to the A.G.A. Sri Sudhir Mehrotra, who shall be in communication with District Magistrate, Deoria after one month in the eventuality of the petitioner's failure to deposit the costs of Rs. 25,000/- as directed, so as to ensure proper compliance by the recovery of the said amount from the petitioner as arrears of land of revenue.
16. The office is directed to send a copy of this order to lower court Civil Judge (S.D.), Court No. 18, Deoria who shall oversee its compliance.