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Entry 14 III of the Seventh Schedule provides for legislation in respect of :

"Contempt of Court, but not including contempt of the Supreme Court."

The language of entry 77 of List I and entry 14 of List III of the Seventh Schedule demonstrate that the legislative power of the Parliament and of the State legislature extends to legislate with respect to matters connected with contempt of court by the Supreme Court or the High Court, subject however, to the qualification that such legislation cannot denude, abrogate or nullify, the power of the Supreme Court to punish for contempt under Articles 129 or vest that power in some other Court.

(2) Subject to the provisions of any law made in this behalf by Parliament, the Supreme Court Shall, as respects the whole of the territory of India, have all and every power to make any order for the purpose of securing the attendance of any person, the discovery or production of any documents, or the investigation or punishment of any contempt of itself.

It is, thus, seen that the power of this court in respect of investigation or punishment of any contempt including contempt of itself, is expressly made 'subject to the provisions of any law made in this behalf by the parliament' by Article 142(2). However, the power to punish for contempt being inherent in a court of record, it follows that no act of parliament can take away that inherent jurisdiction of the Court of Record to punish for contempt and the Parliament's power of legislation on the subject cannot, therefore, be so exercised as to stultify the status and dignity of the Supreme Court and/or the High Courts, though such a legislation may serve as a guide for the determination of the nature of punishment which this court may impose in the case of established contempt. Parliament has not enacted any law dealing with the powers of the Supreme Court with regard to investigation and punishment of contempt of itself. (We shall refer to Section 15 of t he Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, later on) and this Court, therefore exercises the power to investigate and punish for contempt of itself by virtue of the powers vested in it under Articles 129 and 142(2) of the Constitution of India.

The first legislation to deal with contempt of courts in this country was the contempt of courts Act, 1926. it was enacted with a view to define and limit the powers of certain courts for punishing contempts of court. The preamble to that Act stated:

" Whereas doubts have arisen as to the powers of a High Court of judicature to punish contempt of courts and whereas it is expedient to resolve these doubts and to define and limit the powers exercisable by High Courts and Chief Courts in punishing contempts of Court: It is hereby enacted as follows:"
Thus, under the existing legislation dealing with contempt of court, the High Courts and Chief Courts were vested with the power to try a person for committing contempt of court and to punish him for established contempt. The legislation itself prescribed the nature and type, as well as the extent of, punishment which could be imposed on a contemner by the High Courts or the Chief Courts. The second proviso to Section 4 of the 1952 Act (supra) expressly restricted the powers of the Courts not to "impose any sentence in excess of what is specified in the section" for any contempt either of itself or of a court subordinate to it.