Rajesh Pandey
The Allahabad High Court has rejected a plea seeking criminal contempt proceedings against Justice Sunita Agrawal, who is presently the chief justice of the Gujarat High Court.
The plea was made by an advocate, Arun Mishra alleging that while working as a judge of Allahabad High Court, Justice Sunita Agrawal had purposely passed some orders in his cases in a biased manner with an oblique motive just to harass and damage him.
Rejecting the contempt application (criminal), a division bench comprising Justice Rajiv Gupta and Justice Surendra Singh-I said that the plea of the petitioner was entirely misconceived, frivolous, irresponsible, without merit, and therefore liable to be rejected outright
“We have no hesitation to hold that the present criminal contempt application is not only frivolous but is also vexatious. In the interest of the proper functioning of this Institution, such applications should be discouraged by all means. More so, when the litigant happens to be an advocate from whom the court is entitled to accept certain degree of responsibility and restraint as an officer of the court,” the court observed.
Mishra alleged that a writ petition in which he was a lawyer was dismissed in December 2020 by a division bench headed by Justice Sunita Agarwal without allowing him the opportunity to present his arguments. A cost of ₹15,000 was also imposed in that case.
Mishra was also aggrieved by another order passed by a division bench led by Justice Agarwal on February 23, 2021, where a case in which he was representing the petitioner was ‘dismissed for want of prosecution’.
He alleged that, on the same day, in other petitions where the counsel for the petitioners did not appear, the cases were adjourned and scheduled for another date.
He alleged that the order was purposely passed in a biased manner with oblique motives just to harass and damage him. He also claimed that the same “in fact tantamount to contempt of her own court.”
Dealing with Mishra’s arguments, the court at the outset observed that the orders referred to by him were issued by the division bench, presided over by Justice Agrawal, in the exercise of its judicial discretion and based on the facts and circumstances of each case.
The same does not in any way amount to contempt of her own court as claimed by the applicant, who seeks criminal contempt proceedings solely against Justice Agarwal, it added.
The court also noted that in Mishra’s case, the advocate general had denied the consent for initiating the contempt proceedings.
Under Section 15(1) of the Contempt Act, the Supreme Court or High Court can take action of criminal contempt on its own motion or on a motion made by the advocate general or another person with the consent of the advocate general in writing.
The court in its judgment dated September 21 concluded that Justice Agarwal’s act and conduct by no stretch of imagination falls within the definition of criminal contempt and dismissed the plea.