SUB-JUDGE, FIRST CLASS Vs. JAWAHAR LAL RAMCHAND PARWAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a reference by the Sub-ordinate Judge, First Class, Hoshangabad, asking this Court to take action in a matter of contempt committed against the presiding Judge of that Court. It appears that the learned Judge who has made the reference was seised of a case in which the opposite party was involved. One Mt. Radhabai, daughter of Mulchand, had filed Civil Suit No. 11 of 1931 in the Court in question against the opposite party, Jawaharlal and his brothers for, among other things, possession of Mulchand's property including property which had been seized by the District Judge and kept with the Nazir in proceedings under Section 192, Succession Act. The defendants set up a will alleged to have been executed by Mulchand in their favour bequeathing all the property to them. The Court over which the learned Judge who has made this reference was presiding decreed the plaintiff's claim in full and held that the will was a forgery. The defendants appealed to the High Court and there the appeal was dismissed and the finding that the will was a forgery was upheld. The decree-holder then took out execution and the judgment-debtors, including the opposite party, set up an adjustment of the decree but gave no evidence in support of their contention and so the application was dismissed and the decree-holder was given possession of the property in the hands of the Nazir. The next day, the judgment-debtor, Jawaharlal sent a letter under a registered cover to the learned Judge and it is in respect of this letter that the present reference has been made. It appears that the Court was then still seised of the case and that the next hearing was fixed for 15th January 1938. The letter therefore was sent to a Judge seised of the case while he was still exercising jurisdiction in respect of it. The letter is in these terms in so far as it is relevant to the present matter: I have this day come to know that you have, without giving intimation to me, got the safe broken open and have given all the ornaments together with the safe with a brass lock belonging to me to Mt. Radhabai's mukthyars. You have on your responsibility caused all these proceedings against law to be taken with a view to cause loss to me. In case I succeed in appeal, you yourself shall be responsible for the property as the value thereof, due to the above mentioned unlawful acts.

(2.) THE underlining {here italicized) is mine. There can be no doubt that this is contempt of a serious nature. It contains an imputation that the learned Judge has acted unlawfully and with a view to cause the opposite party loss. It contains a threat and contains an imputation against the Judge's impartiality. That is a serious matter which cannot be treated lightly. Judges have to discharge responsible and often disagreeable duties and it is essential that they should be afforded the utmost protection if the administration of justice is to remain independent, clean, fearless, unbiassed and impartial. When notice was issued by the learned Judge to the opposite party, he appeared and after admitting that he had sent the letter in question merely stated that he had nothing to add. No attempt was made to offer an apology and the learned Judge states that he showed no remorse for his conduct and did not utter a single word of regret. In this Court an apology was tendered by the opposite party's learned Counsel but not till after the completion of the arguments on behalf of the Crown, and not till after the case had been argued for a few minutes on his behalf on the merits. An apology at that stage has not much value. There appears to be an impression abroad that an apology consists of a magic formula of words which has but to be uttered as an incantation at the last possible moment when all else has failed and it is evident that retribution is inevitable, to stave off punishment. It appears to be felt that a man should be free to continue unfounded attacks upon another's honour and character and integrity with the utmost license till the last possible moment and then when he is unable to stave off the consequences of his infamous conduct any longer, all he need do is to wave this magic formula referred to as an apology in a Judge's face in order to emerge triumphantly from the fray. Nothing can be further from the truth.

(3.) TURNING now to the present case, there is no shadow of foundation for the attacks which have been made upon the learned Judge who has instituted these proceedings. I can understand, and make allowance for a disappointed litigant who loses his head and says or does something for which he is afterwards sorry. No Court would deal with that harshly; in fact, few Judges would take any notice at all of a human outburst of that kind. But what I have before me now is something very different. Here there is no sudden outburst but the deliberate and cool planning of a hardened litigant who is familiar with the rules of the game. Notice is given and drawn up with all the formalities which one would expect of a man who knows something of the law. Therefore either the opposite party enlisted the services of a petition writer or somebody else of that calibre or he himself possessed the necessary knowledge and experience. Then the notice was sent by registered post, acknowledgment due: another act of deliberation. Then again, when the opposite party was called before the Court and given an opportunity to explain his conduct, he showed no contrition or remorse, offered no explanation (nor has he done so here), uttered no word of regret. This certainly negatives all theory of a foolish outburst made at a time when one's mind was temporarily unhinged. Then again what has been the opposite party's conduct throughout the case ? He set up a will which two Courts, one of them being the High Court, have held to be a forgery. I do not want to say anything on the merits of that question because the prosecution of the opposite party has already been ordered on charges of forgery and per-jury and I am told they are still pending. Therefore those matters are sub judice and I am not assuming that they are true. But a man who in the face of all this has the hardihood to write a minatory and insulting letter of this kind to a Judge who is still seised of his case is not a silly foolish person giving vent to a temperamental outburst but is a cool, deliberate, hardened, litigant who thinks he can coerce and overawe a Judge and thus gain his own ends by crooked means.