Andhra HC (Pre-Telangana)
G. Ranganayakulu And Ors. vs The Registrar, High Court Of Andhra ... on 30 January, 1980
ORDER
1. The petitioners are the members of Machilipatnam Bar where for about seventy-years a Court of Session for the Krishna Division comprising of the territories of the Krishna Revenue District, has been functioning. They now filed this Writ Petition challenging the validity of a Notification issued by the High Court of Andhra Pradesh dated 23-1-1980 directing an Additional Sessions judge Krishna, to sit at Vijayawada and dispose of such of those Sessions Cases and other Criminal matters as are made over to him by the District Judge, Krishna at Machilipatnam. The petitioners raised two main contentions. The first contention of the petitioners is that the aforesaid Notification of the High Court dated 23-1-1980 is illegal and ultra vires of the powers of the High Court under the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code as it amounts to creating a Court of Additional Sessions Judge, Vijayawada within the Sessions Division of Krishna contrary to Section 7 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The second contention of the petitioners is that the Notification has been vitiated by arbitrariness and unreasonableness and is the result of the pressure exerted by the powerful Vijayawada Bar and not the result of the careful application of mind to the need for disposal of the criminal cases. As much of the argument turns upon the aforesaid Notification of the High Court, it is useful to reproduce the said Notification in its entirety.
"Under sub-section (6) of Section 9 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (Act 2 of 1974), the High Court of Andhra Pradesh specifies that with effect on and from the date of the Officer posted assuming charge, the Court of the Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna, as sanctioned in G.O. Ms. No. 31 Home (Courts A) Department, dated 11th January 1980 shall sit at Vijayawada and dispose of the Sessions Cases and other Criminal matters as are made over to him by the District and Sessions Judge, Krishna at Machilipatnam.
2. A perusal of the aforesaid Notification show that it has been issued under sub-section (6) of Section 9 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and in substance directs that the Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna, shall sit at Vijayawada and dispose of such of those sessions cases and other criminal matters as are made over to him by the District and Sessions Judge, Krishna at Machilipatnam. It is clear beyond a shadow of doubt that the Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna, who shall sit at Vijaywada dispose of the criminal matters made over to him under the impugned Notification cannot receive any Criminal Appeals or Criminal Revisions. In other words, notwithstanding the fact that the aforesaid Notification uses the word "Court" what is provided for by the aforesaid Notification of the High Court is not the "establishment" of a Court of an Additional Sessions Judge but only 'posting' of an Additional Sessions Judge at Vijayawada with directions to dispose of such of those criminal cases instituted before the Sessions Court, Krishna at Machilipatnam but which have been made over to him by the District and Sessions Judge Krishna at Masulipatnam. The sine qua non of a Sessions Court under the Code is the legal capacity to receive criminal appeals and Original Criminal Applications and exercise all the powers and perform all the functions of a Sessions Court, as enumerated in the Criminal Procedure Code. The Notification has scrupulously avoided the investiture of any such powers on the Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna. The Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna, under the notification, as we have already noted, can neither receive Criminal Appeals, nor the Original Criminal Applications. In the absence of conferment of those powers and functions the Notification merely calling the Additional Sessions Judge at Vijayawada as a Court would not make it legally into a 'Court'. Mr. Babul Reddy, in support of his contention, stressed upon the fact that the Notification uses the language of an officer being posted as an Additional Sessions Judge. Above all, he argued that if the intention of the Notification is not to establish a Court of Session at Vijayawada but only to specify a place where the Sessions Judge should sit, the Notification should have left the choice of the officer to sit at Vijayawada to the District and Sessions Judge, Krishna at Machilipatnam. I cannot agree. The fact that the Notification clearly uses the language Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna, shows that the Officer to be posted at Vijayawada is an Additional Sessions Judge of the Sessions Court, Krishna at Machilipatnam and not an Additional Sessions Judge of Vijayawada Court. No doubt the Notification uses the word "court", but for the reasons which I have already mentioned above, I consider this use of the language is inadvertent and of no legal significance. There cannot be a Sessions Court without a power to receive Original Applications and appeals.
3. I am therefore unable to agree with the contention of the petitioners that the effect of the aforesaid Notification is to constitute a Court of Additional Sessions Judge, Krishna at Vijayawada. On the other hand, in my opinion the Notification is directly traceable to the powers of the High Court under section 9(6) of the Code of Criminal Procedure read with Section 194 of the same Code. Under Section 9(6) of the Code, the High Court is competent to specify a place or places where a Court of Session shall hold its sittings. Under Section 194 of the Code, the High Court is competent to direct an Additional Sessions Judge to try such cases as a Sessions Judge of the Division may make over to him for trial. In view of the above, I am wholly unable to agree with the contention of Mr. Babul Reddy, the learned counsel for the petitioners that the aforesaid Notification amounts to constituting a Sessions Court at Vijayawada.
4. The last objection of Mr. Babul Reddy also does not appear to me to be correct. The District and Sessions Judge, Krishna, has no more powers under law to decide who should sit at Vijayawada than any other Additional Sessions Judges of Krishna have got. He is merely first among equals in this regard. Clearly, there is no law empowering the District and Sessions Judge to exercise such powers. In fact the learned counsel admitted that there is no law dealing with this question at all. In those circumstances, the High Court exercising its supervisory powers under Article 227 of the Constitution is well within its authority to designate one of the Additional Sessions Judges of Krishna Division to work as an Additional Sessions Judge, at Vijayawada.
5. It is without doubt that, under the Code of Criminal Procedure, you cannot have a Court of Session within the same Division. There cannot be any doubt or dispute about this undoubted legal position. But what I cannot agree with is the contention of the petitioners that the High Court knowingly or unknowingly has violated this mandate of the law contained in Section 7 of the Criminal Procedure Code. As I have shown above, this argument of the petitioners is totally baseless. On the other hand, the High Court is fully conscious of this legal position and has acted in strict accord and in complete harmony with the legal requirements of Sections 7 and 9(6) and 194 of the Criminal Procedure Code and Art. 227 of the Constitution. By directing one of the Additional Sessions Judges of Krishna to sit at Vijayawada and dispose of such of those original matters as are made over to him by the District and Sessions Judge Krishna at Machilipatnam the High Court is merely implementing the law.
6. It is next argued by Mr. Babul Reddy that the impugned Notification is the result of the extraneous influence brought about by the powerful Vijayawada Bar. He stated that in no other Sessions Division in the State such an arrangement has been made. He also said that the work at Machilipatnam with 53 Criminal Appeals 27 Sessions Cases and 188 Criminal Revision Cases, does not warrant this arrangement. In support of this part of his contention he also stated that three former Chief Justices of our High Court have rejected this idea of an Additional Sessions Judge sitting at Vijayawada and that there are Sessions Divisions like Cuddapah and Kurnool with large pendency of Criminal cases but without similar arrangements. I am afraid I cannot give any weight to any of these general, vague, and amorphous arguments. When the State Government and the High Court felt the need to bring justice to the door-steps of those living in and around Vijayawada and when there is a clear legal provision permitting them to translate that laudable desire into action and the authorities act according to the provision of law, it would not be open for me to re-evaluate the needs of the litigant public of that area. It may be that there are public of that area. It may be that there are other places where the need is equally urgent but that would not be a legal consideration which can be taken into account for holding the impugned notification to be illegal. I must say with due respect to the former Chief Justices that their opinion of objection to this arrangement of which I have no knowledge cannot be taken to be decisive of the matter in issue.
We must be governed by the present and shed the burden of the past. The question whether there is enough work for the Sessions Division at Machilipatnam is wholly immaterial in considering whether this facility should or should not be extended to any other parts of Sessions Division. After all, law Courts are not established for the benefit of lawyers alone any more than Government Hospitals are maintained for the profit of the Doctors and public Officers are created for the gain of the politicians. We are the grand heirs to the spirit of Magna Carta which ordained that to none we should sell justice, to none we should deny it. A lawyer is called to the Bar to perform serious and socred social duty. He is not a mere carpet bagger. To be called a Priest in Ireland, a Soldier in Germany a scholar in France and Barrister in England is regarded as the highest honour. Attempts to bring criminal justice to the doorsteps of the litigant public cannot therefore be thwarted by considerations of pecuniary loss to certain members of the Bar. I therefore reject this argument of the petitioners an unmertitorious.
7. Finally Mr. Babul Reddy contended that the sanctioning of this arrangement in G.O. Ms. No. 31, Home (Courts-A) dated 11-1-1980 is inconsistent with the Finance Commission's recommendations. The short answer is when the State Government has sent these proposals proposing to establish these Courts including the Court of an Additional Sessions Judge at Vijayawada, the Union Government had approved them by its letter dated 17-12-1979.
8. For all the aforesaid reasons, I dismiss the Writ Petition.
9. Writ petition dismissed.