Gujarat High Court
State Of Gujarat vs Mangaldas Kanchanlal Rana on 10 January, 1986
Equivalent citations: (1986)2GLR1400
JUDGMENT D.H. Shukla, J.
1. The present contemner, Mangaldas Kanchanlal Rana, partner of M/s. G.M. Rana, a registered partnership firm, residing at Sankheda, District Baroda, preferred Civil Revision Application No. 902 of 1984 in this Court, challenging the order passed by the learned Civil Judge (J.D.), Sankheda, below Exh. 60 in Regular Civil Suit No. 271 of 1982, Exh. 60 in Regular Civil Suit No. 271 of 1982 appears to be an application filed by the contemner to amend his reply, Exh. 32, which was given with reference to application, Exh. 13. The trial Court was of the view that the reply, Exh. 32, was given after the stage of filing the reply. Hence, Exh. 32 was not taken into consideration for the purpose of deciding application, Exh. 13. Exh. 13 was, in fact, already decided on 10-3-1983 by the predecessor of the trial Judge concerned. Hence, the application, Exh. 60, dt. 30-4-1984, for the amendment of the reply, Exh. 32, was dismissed. Having been aggrieved by the aforesaid order, rejecting the amendment application, the contemner filed Civil Revision Application No. 902 of 1984 in this Court. In the memo of the said Civil Revision Application, he made the following statements:
In Regular Darkhast No. 21/19 the learned Civil Judge involved with my defendant and with my politician enemies with a resjudicator order against the principle of law and against evidence of record intentionally and deliberately by that way made a contempt of the Hon'ble High Court. So the present petitioner applied to the Hon'ble High Court and Supreme Court at Delhi, hence the learned Civil Judge Sankheda is keeping prejudice mind with mala fide intention and made so many false orders against the principles of law and against the evidence of the record and facts and made me too much financial damage, so present petitioner made a transfer application to the Hon'ble District Court, Baroda. Although the defendant was agreed to transfer this case in his written statement, Hon'ble District Judge, involved with learned Civil Judge Sankheda and by mutual understanding with each other to harass me and to make injustice me, the case was not transferred. The learned Civil Judge Sankheda is also giving mental trouble by giving short dates of a week and punish me 11 to 5.00 p.m. by sitting in the Court.
(The statements stated above are reproduced verbatim from the memo of Civil Revision Application).
2. The above Civil Revision Application was dismissed by Brother G.T. Nanavati, J. by his order dated 22-6-1984, wherein he observed as under:
Ex.60 was given long time after Ex. 13 was decided. Ex. 32 was a reply to Ex. 13. If in these circumstances, the Court rejected Ex. 60, it cannot be said that it has acted wrongly. Hence rejected.
3. While dismissing the Civil Revision Application, Brother Nanavati J. passed the following order, dated 22-6-1984:
Registrar to examine if the allegations made in this Revision Application amount to contempt of Court.
In pursuance to this order, the Registrar submitted a note dated 30-12-1984 to the learned Chief Justice for his permission to place the papers before the court for judicial determination. The learned Chief Justice granted permission, vide order dated 13-12-1984. Thereafter, the matter, being Criminal Misc. Application No. 2126 of 1984 (for contempt) was placed before the Division Bench, consisting of N.H. Bhatt and R.A. Mehta, JJ. The Division Bench issued rule returnable on 29-1-1985, and thereafter on 20-6-1985 directed the issuance of bailable warrant in the sum of Rs. 2,000/- against the contemner. The contemner was present before the said Division Bench on 29-7-1985, and the Division Bench asked him a question: "Prima fade it appears to this Court that the allegations (a) and (c) and (d) against the Civil Judge and allegation (a) against the District Judge amount to contempt of court. Do you want to say anything?" The contemner answered: "I do not know whether this would amount to any contempt of court. To me it appears that when a litigant suffers any damage or loss, he would make grievance." Thereafter, the contemner requested for time, which was granted. We may note at this stage that in the meantime, the contemner has submitted his statement dated 30-4-1985, wherein he has elaborately ventilated his grievance, which he suffered during the progress of Regular Civil Suit No. 271 of 1982. It is not necessary for us for deciding this contempt application to enumerate here the several grievances which he has made against the trial judge. It is, however, relevant to state that the contemner has stated that whatever allegations he had made are true and that if they are found to be false, he may be hanged. He has also stated that if a humble citizen makes a grievance about the injustice suffered by him at the hands of a judicial officer, is he committing an offence? He has also stated that he had made about 25 to 30 applications to the Hon'ble Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court to investigate into his complaint, and he has also stated in those applications that if his allegations were found to be false, he may be hanged. Still, no departmental inquiry has been made and that is unfortunate.
4. The matter came up for hearing before this Division Bench, and the contemner was asked what he did have to say in the matter. He submitted that whatever allegations he has made are made out of exasperation on account of his suits and Darkhast not producing any substantial result in his favour, and particularly with a view to invite the attention of the higher court, but he did not intend to commit any contempt of the court. He has also stated that he is a merchant having a small shop of grocery in Sankheda town and that he is not financially capable to indulge in protracted litigation. At that stage, he had also stated that he felt sorry for the statement which he had made and that it was only on account of the feeling of exasperation that he made those statements in his revision application. The learned Public Prosecutor, Mr. G.D. Bhatt was also of the opinion that the contmner suffers from a feeling of persecution and that is why he made these statements out of exasperation. We decided to accept his explanation and discharge the notice. But, before we could sign the order of discharge of notice, he changed his mind and said that he wanted to establish the allegations levelled against the learned Civil Judge as well as the learned District Judge and that he wanted two weeks' time for studying the record and proceedings of Regular Darkhast No. 21 of 1979. The contemner has filed his detailed reply dated 16-10-1985 along with a letter, addressed to the learned Chief Justice. In the said letter he has stated: "I had tried to lead your kind attention how the justice is taken place in the courts of Gujarat. I had applied more than 30 applications to make inspection departmentally on my serious complaints, but no any Hon'ble Chief Justice had noted of my serious allegations. On seeing records your Lordships will be pleased to take proper legal steps and try to remove decay of the courts of Gujarat...."
5. In his reply, he has repeated all the allegations which he had earlier made in his reply dt. 30-4-1985. Herein also, he has repeated at the end of the statement: "On seeing false orders of learned judges below exhibits shown by me, Your Lordships will see these exhibits in records. If my allegations are proved false and against the gospel truth, please hang me and punish me as you like. If Hon'ble Judges are proved guilty, please take proper legal steps against them and punish them also. Law is equal for all mankind under Constitution of India."
6. We have carefully considered the charges levelled against the contemner. It is true that he has attributed collusion to the learned Civil Judge with the opponent of the contemner. It is also true that he has expressly attributed mala fide intention behind, what the contemner calls, false orders. He has also attributed collusion to the learned District Judge with the Civil Judge, Sankheda. Prima facie, these allegations do appear to be contemptuous of the concerned Judges. However, we kept before us the observations of Krishna Iyer, J. in Re: Shri S. Mulgaokar AIR 1978 Supreme Court 727 that "'a normative guideline for the Judges to observe in this jurisdiction' was not to be hypersensitive where distortions and criticism overstep the limits, but to deflate vulgar denunciation by dignified bearing, condescending indifference and repudiation by judicial rectitude."
7. We also were conscious that contempt proceedings attract a power vested in this Court, which it is necessary to exercise delicately, sparingly and after due consideration of all the circumstances involved in the matter. The power is primarily required to be exercised for the purpose of preventing interference with the course of justice and for maintaining authority of law as is administered in Courts. As observed in Brahma Prakash Sharma and Ors. v. The State of Uttar Pradesh : "The object of contempt proceedings is not to afford protection to Judges personally from imputations to which they may be exposed as individuals, it is intended to be a protection to the public whose interests would be very much affected if by the act or conduct of any party, the authority of the court is lowered and the sense of confidence which people have in the administration of justice by it is weakened". It is further observed therein as under:
There are two primary considerations which should weigh with the court when it is called upon to exercise the summary powers in cases of contempt committed by 'scandalising' the court itself. In the first place, the reflection on the conduct or character of a judge in reference to the discharge of his judicial duties, would not be contempt if such reflection is made in the exercise of the right of fair and reasonable criticism which every citizen possesses in respect of public acts done in the seat of justice. It is not by stifling criticism that confidence in courts can be created.
In the second place, when attacks or comments are made on a judge or judges, disparaging in character and derogatory to their dignity, care should be taken to distinguish between what is a libel on the judge and what amounts really to contempt of court. The fact that a statement is defamatory so far as the judge is concerned does not necessarily make it a contempt.
It is further observed as under:
A defamatory attack on a judge may by a libel so far as the judge is concerned and it would be open to him to proceed against the libeller in a proper action if he so chooses, if however, the publication of the disparaging statement is calculated to interfere with the due course of justice or proper administration of law by such court, it can be punished summarily as contempt. One is a wrong done to the judge personally while the other is a wrong done to the public. It will be an injury to the public if it tends to create an apprehension in the minds of the people regarding the integrity, ability or fairness of the judge or to deter actual and prospective litigants from placing complete reliance upon the court's administration of justice, or if it is likely to cause embarrassment in the mind of the judge himself in the discharge of his judicial duties.
The circumstances under which the aspersions are cast must be taken into consideration, as also the fact of the degree of publicity which would be a relevant consideration to decide about the possibility of an effect adverse to the administration of justice in the minds of the people at large.
8. Section 6 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, runs as under:
6. A person shall not be guilty of contempt of court in respect of any statement made by him in good faith concerning the presiding officer of any subordinate court to-
(a) any other subordinate court, or
(b) the High Court, to which it is subordinate.
Explanation.-In this section, "subordinate court" means any court subordinate to a High Court.
9. The provision in this section merely emphasises the existing law that where a person complains about a person to another judge to whom the former is subordinate and the complaint is made in good faith with a view to obtain redress it cannot be deemed as offending the law of contempt. This protection is necessary in the name of good administration of justice so that in proper cases there may be an appropriate directive by the superior judge to the subordinate judge, so that the tone of administration of justice gets improved, devoid of the errors complained of."
10. We have perused the reply filed by the contemner, and it does appear to us that the complaints are made in good faith, i.e. to say without any improper motive only to run down a Judge or to bring pressure upon him in discharging his duties. The complaints are made to the High Court. The contemner, as per his say, had filed 25 to 30 applications ventilating his grievance and requesting for a departmental inquiry, but, it seems, these applications were turned down. The contemner cast aspersions against the judicial officers in his Civil Revision. Application No. 902 of 1984. It is true that the High Court on its judicial side was not the proper forum for him to cast such aspersions in a Revision Application. It is also true that he has overstepped the limits of propriety by imputing motives to judicial officers. On the other hand, it must also be borne in mind that what he has stated is in the nature of a complaint to the High Court against subordinate judicial officers, after having made 25 to 30 applications to hold departmental inquiries against them. We also bear in mind that the publication of aspersions is limited to the High Court only and that it is not given wider publicity. It also cannot be gainsaid that the contemner is exasperated by the delay in realising the fruits of his decree. He is a semi-literate person and one belonging to a middle class. The exasperation on his part is understandable, though the grievances which he has made may or may not be correct. It is a different question whether the administrative inquiry is ordered or not, after the disposal of the Darkhast No. 21 of 1979 (if it is not already disposed of). But to hold the contemner liable for contempt, under the circumstances, would certainly be to aggravate his ruffled feelings.
11. In view of the above, we discharge the rule issued in this Criminal Misc. Application.