- (1.) This criminal contempt petition has been filed by the applicant with a prayer to take suo moto action for initiating criminal contempt proceedings against the opposite party for disobedience of the directions issued by the Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of D.K. Basu v. Stare of Bengal, and the order passed by the Division Bench of this Court in Virendra Singh and Ors. v. State of U.P. and Ors.
(2.) We have heard the learned Counsel for the Petitioner and Shri Sudhir Mehrotra, the learned AGA appearing on behalf of the State. At the very outset the learned State counsel has submitted that it would not be a case of contempt at all. Criminal and Civil contempt has been defined in the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971. Section 2(b) of the Contempt of Courts Act reads as under: (b) "Civil Contempt" means willful disobedience to any judgment, decree, direction, order; writ or other process of a Court or willful breach of an undertaking given to a Court; Criminal contempt has been defined in Sub-section c of Section 2 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, which reads as under: (c) "criminal contempt" means the publication (whether bywords, spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise) of any matter or the doing of any other act whatsoever which: (i) scandalises or tends to scandalise, or lowers or tends to lower the authority of, any Court; or (ii) prejudices, or interferes or tends to interfere with, the due course of any judicial proceeding; or (iii) interferes or tends to interfere with, or obstructs or tends to obstruct, the administration of justice in any other manner;
(3.) The grievance of the Petitioner is that the opposite party who has been impleaded by name did not follow the requirements as enumerated in the case of D.K. Basu v. State of Bengal, 1997 1 JT 1, as well as the order passed by the Division Bench of this Court in the case of Virendra Singh and Ors. v. State of U.P. and Ors.,2002 45 ACC 609 and the Petitioner was detained in custody, flouting the directions of the Hon'ble Supreme Court.;