Gujarat High Court Upholds 30-Days Civil Imprisonment Of Man Who Sold Shop Despite Status-Quo Order

The Gujarat High Court has upheld the 30 days civil-imprisonment order of man who sold a shop despite status-quo order.

The Court was considering a Petition against an order of the Trial Court in a Regular Civil Suit which was later affirmed by the Appellate Court.

The single bench of Justice JL Odedra observed, "In view of this petition, this Court believes that without mentioning the alternative options available to this Court, (or for that matter the Trial Court and the First Appellate Court, which could have weighed those options for exercising other mode of consequences owing to the disobedience of breach of injunction), the order of the Trial Court and that of the Appellate Court cannot be faulted on the ground that the said Courts did not weigh alternative options for exercising whilst punishing for breach for injunction."

The Petitioner was represented by Advocate Prateek S. Bhatia while the Respondent was represented by Advocate Vishwa G. Patel.

Facts of the Case

It was submitted that in the original suit, interim relief was granted whereby the shop belonging to the present Petitioner was ordered not to be sold and status quo in respect of the same was to be maintained as it was observed that whether the possession of the Shop is legal or otherwise is a matter of evidence.

However, the said shop came to be sold in the year 2017 and the impugned order came to be passed. When an Appeal against the same was filed, the Appellant admitted that owing to his disability he sometimes forgets, and that for those reasons, he forgot that there existed a status-quo order against the selling of the said shop. It was his case that the said shop was sold but it was not a deliberate act to flout the orders of the court.

The Counsel for the Petitioner contended that the shop was sold out of need. He further contended that the proportionality of the consequences as narrated in the Order 39 Rule A of the Code of Civil Procedure, should have been weighed, especially considering the disability of the petitioner. It was thus submitted that the Court ought not to have ordered civil imprisonment of 30 days and should have weighed other options available to it, namely, attachment of the property of the person guilty of such disobedience

Reasoning By Court

The Court observed that such vague and utterly cooked up versions cannot be relied on. The contentions of the Counsel for the Petitioner were duly rejected.

The Petition was accordingly dismissed.

Cause Title: Dipakkumar Kirtilal Shah vs. Navinkumar Bansidhar Maheshwari

Click here to read/ download Order