Orissa High Court Imposes ₹10,000 Cost On Litigant Raising Fake Padma Shree Award Claim

The Orissa High Court has imposed ₹10,000/- cost on a litigant for filing a Writ Petition raising a claim to be a Padma Shree Awardee as against a person with the same name.

The Writ Petition was filed seeking clarification in respect to the candidature of Padmashri Awardee, which is in dispute between the Petitioner and the Opposite Party No.2, who was allegedly impersonating the Petitioner, claiming to be the Padmashri Awardee.

The single bench of Justice S.K. Panigrahi observed, "Considering the facts and submissions made, this Court is of the view that the Petitioner has approached this Court on the basis of some phone calls from somebody stating that he is the recipient of the “Padmashri Award” for the year 2023 in the field of Literature. Despite a few adjournments were granted to the Petitioner to place on record all the documents which embolden his claim, the Petitioner has failed to submit any document where his name has been figured as a “Padmashri Awardee”. This shows that the Petitioner has unnecessarily created controversy and also demeaned the prestige of the award and tried to malign the image of the Opposite Party No.2."

The Petitioner was represented by Advocate Sangramjit Panda while the Respondent was represented by DSGI P. K. Parhi.

Counsel for the Petitioner submitted that the Petitioner had applied for the Padmashri Award. After a few days, the Petitioner came to know that some other person having same name impersonated himself to be the Padmashri Awardee and gave an interview to the Newspaper. After knowing the same, the Petitioner approached the Public Information Officer in regard to clarification of the candidature and he was asked to approach the Delhi Police.

He further submitted that the Petitioner is a professional writer and has written more than 29 numbers of books in Odia Language while the alleged impersonator is a journalist by profession and has never written any book.

The Counsel contended that the Petitioner had received a call from the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India in relation to his selection for “Padmashri Award” for his dedication towards the Odia Language and Literature.

The Court declined the submissions of the Counsel for the Petitioner and called the claim so made by the Petitioner an unnecessary controversy and imposed cost on the Petitioner for unnecessarily wasting the valuable time of the Court.

The Petition was thus dismissed with a cost of ₹10,000/-.

Cause Title: Antaryami Mishra vs. Union of India & Anr.

Appearances:

Petitioner- Advocate Sangramjit Panda

Respondent- DSGI P. K. Parhi, CGC D. Gochhayat, Senior Advocate N. K. Mishra, Senior Advocate S. S. Das, Advocate S. Das

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