Justice B.V. Nagarathna, Justice Satish Chandra Sharma, Supreme Court
Speaking Or Non-Speaking Order Dismissing SLP Doesn’t Attract Doctrine Of Merger: Supreme Court
|The Supreme Court allowed a Civil Appeal against the Uttarakhand High Court's Order, rejecting an Application seeking recall of an Order.
The Supreme Court observed that its Order refusing Special Leave to Appeal does not stand substituted in place of the Order under challenge.
The Court observed thus in a Civil Appeal filed against the Order of the Uttarakhand High Court by which the Application seeking recall of an Order was rejected.
The two-Judge Bench comprising Justice B.V. Nagarathna and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma enunciated, “… having regard to the judgment of this Court in Kunhayammed v. State of Kerala, AIR 2000 SC 2587, an order refusing special leave to appeal may be a non-speaking or speaking order. In either case it does not attract the doctrine of merger. An order refusing special leave to appeal does not stand substituted in place of the order under challenge.”
Senior Advocate Devadatt Kamat represented the Appellant while AOR Gunnam Venkateswara Rao represented the Respondents.
Facts of the Case
The Plaintiff applied for a Rajiv Gandhi Rural LPG distributor position in Village Chudiyala, Tejupur, after responding to an advertisement by the Defendant No. 1. The eligibility criteria included being a permanent resident of the notified Nyaya Panchayat, an Indian citizen, having completed 10th grade education, fulfilling multiple dealership norms, and owning a 20x24-meter plot. The Plaintiff alleged that the Defendant No. 3 i.e., the Appellant, a resident of Village Sherpur, Shahpur, District Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, was appointed despite not meeting the eligibility criteria. He claimed that the said Appellant's appointment was based on a fake domicile certificate.
But the Plaintiff’s objections were ignored, and the Appellant was appointed. The Plaintiff then filed a Suit, which was dismissed by the Trial Court and his Appeal was also dismissed. The High Court allowed the Second Appeal, setting aside the lower Court Orders and directing the Defendant No.1 to conduct a fresh exercise for granting the dealership. However, the High Court did not decree the Suit in the Plaintiff's favour and thereafter, the Appellant filed a Review Petition, which was dismissed. The Appellant then approached the Supreme Court, which also dismissed his Appeal. He then filed another Review Petition, which was again dismissed and hence, he was before the Apex Court.
Reasoning
The Supreme Court after hearing the arguments from both sides, said, “… the Court was no inclined to exercise its discretion so as to allow an appeal being filed. In the circumstances, the dismissal of the Special Leave Petition (Civil) No.41568/2019 as well as the Review Petition (Diary) No. 56394/2024 by this Court would not come in the way of the reconsideration of the second appeal by the High Court.”
“We do not wish to go into that aspect of the matter on merits but we find that we ought to give the appellant another opportunity of addressing his case before the High Court”, it added.
The Court further noted that, fraud unravels everything and in the peculiar facts of this, the impugned Order and the Judgment are liable to be set aside.
The Court, therefore, directed the parties to appear before the High Court on February 18, 2025 without expecting any separate notices from the Court, since they were represented by their respective counsel.
“The High Court is requested to dispose of S.A. No.140/2016 by considering the respective contentions of the parties, the additional pleadings or applications and evidences that may be filed or let in by the parties and after framing the substantial questions of law. … Liberty is reserved to both sides to place additional evidence before the High Court in accordance with law”, it concluded.
Accordingly, the Apex Court allowed the Appeal.
Cause Title- Vipin Kumar v. Jaydeep & Others (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 169)
Appearance:
Appellant: Senior Advocate Devadatt Kamat, AOR Devyani Gupta, Advocates Tanvi Anand, Revanta Solanki, and Hruday Bajentri.
Respondents: AORs Gunnam Venkateswara Rao, Priya Puri, Ashutosh Kumar Sharma, Advocates Poli Naidu Vudamala, Sachin Dubey, Pinki Aggarwal, Sharad Kumar Puri, Vibhav Srivastava, and Ajay Kumar Bahuguna.