Delhi High Court
Indian Music Industry (Imi) vs Charanajit Gupta @ Chandi And Ors. on 4 September, 1997
Equivalent citations: 70(1997)DLT60
Author: D.K. Jain
Bench: D.K. Jain
JUDGMENT D.K. Jain, J.
(1) This petition under Section 15 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 (for short the Act), has been filed for initiating action of criminal contempt against the respondents on the plea that by preventing the Local Commissioner from executing the commission on 29th August, 1996, in terms of the orders passed by this Court on 26th August, 1996 in Suit No. 2016/96, the respondents have not only deliberately and wilfully flouted the said order, they treated the two Local Commissioner, who visited the premises of the respondents as officers of this Court to enforce and execute the orders passed this Court, with utmost disrespect and contempt, and have thus, scandalised and lowered the authority of this Court; prejudiced and interfered with the due course of judicial proceedings and obstructed the administration to justice, thereby committing a criminal contempt within the meaning of Section 2(c) of the Act.
(2) The petition initially filed on 29th August, 1997, was refiled on 30th August, 1997 after removing the objections. It was listed in Court on 1st September, 1997. When the matter came up for hearing on 1st September, 1997, the Court felt that the petition was barred under Section 20 of the Act as by then the period of one year from the date of which the contempt is alleged to have been committed by the respondents, i.e., 29th August, 1996, had expired. Faced with the situation, learned Counsel for the petitioner got the case adjourned to the next day to satisfy the Court that the petition was not barred under the said Section. The matter was accordingly adjourned to 2nd September, 1997 to 3rd September, 1997 and has been finally heard today.
(3) Learned Counsel for the petitioner has contended that the petition is not barred by time because: (1) it has been instituted (29 August, 1997) within a period of one year from the date of the alleged incident (29 August, 1996) and (ii) the petitioner having moved the Standing Counsel (Criminal) for the Delhi Administration for his requisite consent under Section 15 (l)(c) of the Act, before the expiry of one year, the time taken by the Counsel in responding to the request of the petitioner should be excluded while computing one year. In support of the second contention, reliance is placed on a Full Bench judgment of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, reported as Manjit Singh & Ors. v. Darshan Singh 6- Ors., 1984 Criminal Law Journal 301, wherein, while observing that the term "initiate" occurring in Section 20 of the Act should be constructed in the light of Section 15, it was held that where litigant had, with the utmost expedition, either moved the Court or the Advocate General for the grant of his consent, the matter being out of his hands, his petition should not be thrown out on the ground that the period of limitation had been crossed, either because of tardy progress of the Court or to the inaction of the Advocate General.
(4) Both the contentions are devoid of any merit.
(5) Section 20 of the Act provides that no Court shall initiate any proceedings for contempt either on its own motion or otherwise, after the expiry of a period of one year from the date on which the contempt is alleged to have been committed. It is obvious that the bar contained in the Section is absolute. It is clear from the language of the section that the period of one year commences from the date on which the contempt is alleged to have been committed. What is provided in the Section is not the period of limitation as it is ordinarily understood in the context of the Limitation Act, 1963. Therefore, in the instant case, even the institution of petition on 29 August, 1997 was beyond the period of one year from the date on which the contempt was alleged to have been committed, the same having expired on 28 August, 1997.
(6) What Section 20 of the Act talks of is "initiation" of proceedings by a Court. It is axiomatic that "initiation" of contempt proceedings would be only when the Court has applied its mind and passed some order. "Institution" of a petition for proceedings under the Act cannot be equated with "initiation" of proceedings by the Court. The two are distinct stages. The first is the institution, which is just filing of the petition in the Court and the second is its consideration and initiation of action thereon by the Court. Thus, if an application for taking action under the Act is filed within a period of one year from the date of the alleged commission of contempt, but the Court has passed no order thereon before the expiry of one year from the said date, such application automatically fail because the Court could not apply its mind to complaint within a period of one year. Even assuming that the petition filed on 20 August, 1997 was within a year, it could not normally have been put up before the Court for consideration within the stipulated period of one year and therefore, when it was placed before the Court on 1 September, 1997 for orders, the jurisdiction of the Court to initiate action for contempt was barred under the said Section. Support of this view is lent by the decision of the Supreme Court in Baradakanta Mishra v. Mr. Justice Gatikrushna Mishra, , wherein , Supreme Court, while dealing with the question whether an appeal was maintainable against the order initiating the proceeding for contempt held that : "IT is only when the Court decides to take action and initiates a proceeding for contempt that it assumes jurisdiction to punish for contempt. The exercise of the jurisdiction to punish for contempt commences with the initiation of a proceeding for contempt, whether suo motu or on a motion or a reference. That is why the terminus a quo for the period of limitation provided in Section 20 is the date when a proceeding for contempt is initiated by the Court."
(7) In Purushotam Das Goel v. Hon'ble Justice B.S. Dhillon, , the Supreme Court observed that proceedings under Section 17 of the Act get initiated on issuance of a notice by a Court.
(8) The submission that the period during which petitioner's request for consent was pending with the Standing Counsel should be excluded while computing the period of one year under Section 20 of the Act, in my view, is fallacious. No provision exists in the Act which, in any manner, stop running of time of one year as contemplated in the said Section. Having regard to the language and the tenor of the Section, it has to be strictly construed. The acceptance of plea of the petitioner would render Section 20 of the Act redundant and otiose.
(9) For the view I have taken on Section 20 of the Act and in the light of the afore noted two judgments of the Supreme Court, with utmost respect, I am unable to subscribe to the view expressed by the Full Bench of the Punjab & Haryana High Court in Manjit Singh's case (supra), which is otherwise distinguishable on facts. Unlike in that case, where the petitioner had moved the Advocate General with utmost expedition, in the instant case admittedly the petitioner took almost eleven months to approach the Standing Counsel for his consent. It seems that while holding that a mere motion by a party to the Advocate General for grunt of consent amounts to "initiation" of proceedings within the meaning of Section 20 of the Act, the decision of the Supreme Court in Purushotam Das Goel's case (supra), has escaped the attention of the Full Bench.
(10) For all these reasons I am of the considered view that the present petition is barred under Section 20 of the Act and is accordingly dismissed in limine.