Calcutta High Court
Puspa Sengupta vs Dr. Parijat Dey on 20 February, 2009
Author: Maharaj Sinha
Bench: Maharaj Sinha
CC No.102 of 2008
GA NO.2360 OF 2008
WP No.2018 of 2006
IN THE HIGH COURT AT CALCUTTA
Special Civil Jurisdiction
ORIGINAL SIDE
IN THE MATTER OF:-
PUSPA SENGUPTA
Versus
DR. PARIJAT DEY
For Petitioner :Ms.Rita Sinha, Advocate with
Mr.Debasish Purkait, Advocate.
For Respondent :Ms.Seba Roy, Advocate
BEFORE:
The Hon'ble JUSTICE MAHARAJ SINHA Date : 20 February 2009.
The Court :-On 24 April 2008 an order was passed in terms of prayers [d](i) and [d] (ii) of the writ petition and the said order was to be implemented within a period of four weeks from the date of communication of that order.
It appears from the above order dated 24 April 2008 that in spite of service none appeared on behalf of the respondents and in spite of an opportunity given to the respondents to file the affidavit/s-in-opposition, no such affidavit was used by the respondents. For the sake of convenience the first two paragraphs of the said order are set out below:-
"In spite of service none appears on behalf of the respondents. In fact on the earlier occasion, namely on 16th January, 2007 this Court said that without affidavit the writ petition could not be disposed of or rather decided and that is why an opportunity was given to the respondents to file the affidavit/s-in-opposition. In spite thereof, no affidavits have been used by any of the respondents.2
None appears today on behalf of the respondents either. The husband of the petitioner died on 23rd January, 1990. It appears that he was appointed as a demonstrator of MBC Institute of Engineering and Technology in the district of Burdwan, on 22nd of July, 1962. The petitioner, however, is claiming the relief on the basis of a notification dated 6th April, 1977."
The above order is annexed to the contempt petition appearing at page 52 thereof. I have no manner of doubt in my mind that the alleged contemnor has not complied with the order although he was obliged to comply with the same.
Mrs. Roy, learned Counsel appearing on behalf of the State respondents, has made an application, G.A.No.2360 of 2008 for recalling of the said order, namely, dated 24 April 2008 primarily on the ground that the notification on the basis of which the said order was passed on 24 April 2008 was not placed in Court in its entirety. I do not think that the application made by the respondents at this stage for recalling of the order is at all maintainable as the respondents, having had the fullest opportunity to contest the writ proceeding, did not choose to contest the writ petition at any stage until the initiation of the contempt proceeding and the respondents cannot be allowed to take advantage of their own wrong as they had chosen not to contest the proceeding in spite of repeated opportunities. The present application is not to be entertained also on the ground that the said application will have the effect of upsetting the order passed in favour of the writ petitioner. The writ petitioner obtained the order after satisfying this Court that the writ petitioner was entitled to the relief as granted in his favour by the said order. Since the order in question is an appealable order, I am not at all minded to entertain this prayer for recalling the order in question.
Thus this application is dismissed, but having regard to the submissions made by Mrs. Roy there will be no order as to costs.
3
However, there will be a Rule as prayed for against the alleged contemnor.
The matter is made returnable on 20 March 2009.
Department, the alleged contemnor and all parties are to act on a xerox signed copy of this order on the usual undertakings.
(MAHARAJ SINHA, J.) NM Assistant Registrar (C.R.)