- (1.) The insurance company seeks to challenge an order passed by the State Consumer Forum allowing a claim under the Consumer Protection Act, 1986. It is the admitted position that such order is appellable under the said Act. The petitioner insists that the fact that an appeal is available to a party will not stand in the way of the High Court exercising of its authority under Article 227 of the Constitution and receiving a grievance of the present kind. In support of such contention, the petitioner refers to a judgment reported at (2003) 6 SCC 675 which was rendered on the scope of Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution in the light of the 2002 amendment to the Civil Procedure Code that restricted the operation of Section 115 of the Code. The petitioner says that it has been recognised by the Supreme Court that when there is an erroneous assumption of jurisdiction by a judicial or quasi-judicial forum over which the High Court exercises superintendence and a complaint in such regard is carried under Article 227 of the Constitution, the High Court will not refuse to entertain the same merely because the order impugned is appellable.
(2.) The petitioner refers to Clause 7 of the general conditions governing the insurance contract and the part therein that provides that if a suit is not filed in pursuance of a claim within three months of the repudiation of the claim by the insurance company, the insured would have no further recourse in respect of the claim. The petitioner says that despite the validity of such clause having been upheld by the courts over the years, even in the face of Section 28 of the Contract Act, 1872, the State Consumer Forum refused to examine such aspect of the matter and the order impugned does not reveal that such consideration weighed with the forum. As to the validity of the clause, the petitioner refers to a judgment reported at 27 CWN 955. The petitioner says that there are several recent judgments to the same effect. That the order carried to a High Court under Article 227 of the Constitution is also appellable does not make the proceedings before the High Court not maintainable. The existence of an alternative remedy implies that the court has the authority to receive the petition; or else, the other would not have been an alternative. However, ordinarily, the High Court in an act of judicial self-restraint would not entertain such a matter. There are good grounds therefor. To begin with, if the statute confers the right of appeal to a party or any other person, such party or person should pursue 1/2 and be made to pursue - the remedy of appeal in preference to the extraordinary remedy that is recognised by Article 227 of the Constitution. Further, when there is a specialised forum mandated by statute to take up a particular kind of matter, the more general authority exercised under Article 227 of the Constitution should not be made easily accessible to a person to whom the appellate remedy is available, save in the judicially recognised exceptional circumstances and to prevent a grave miscarriage of justice. Petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution are routinely not entertained on the ground that there is some other remedy available in respect of the conduct complained of, either under the general law of the land or under any special statute. As in the case of a writ court wielding authority under Article 226 of the Constitution exercising an extent of self-restraint by requiring a petitioner before it to pursue the remedy available under the general law or the special statute, similarly the court exercising jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution will also require the petitioner before it to avail of the specific remedy if there is one.
(3.) However , if there is a palpably erroneous assumption of jurisdiction that is ex facie apparent from the order impugned, the High Court may not push the petitioner before it to the alternative forum and may take up the matter itself. Even in such case the assumption of the jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution must necessarily be on the Court 's satisfaction that there would be serious injustice otherwise. The primary object of the Article is to uphold the sanctity of the judicial process and it confers an extraordinary power to the highest courts of the state to correct the decisions and the decision-making process of all judicial or quasi-judicial forums over which they exercise superintendence by virtue of the situs of such forums within the territories over which the High Courts ' writs run.;