Filed Preposterous Application; Made Unwarranted Remarks On Judges: Gujarat HC Imposes ₹2L Cost On Applicant
The Gujarat High Court said that the filing of a preposterous Application and making unwarranted remarks on the Judges is contumacious conduct by the Applicant and Advocate.
The Gujarat High Court has imposed a cost of Rs. 2 lakhs on an Applicant in a Contempt case.
The Court said that the filing of apreposterous Application and making unwarranted remarks on the Judges is contumacious conduct by the Applicant and Advocate.
A Division Bench comprising Justice A.S. Supehia and Justice Gita Gopi remarked, “There cannot be any cavil on the legal precedent stemming out from the case laws cited before us but it cannot rescue the applicant from the frivolity of the application. The tenor of the application and the submissions advanced do not even remotely connect with the law of contempt so far it concerns, the respondents and the learned advocates appearing for them, but to the contrary, filing of preposterous application and making unwarranted remarks on the learned Single Judges is contumacious conduct by the applicant and learned advocate Mr.Khosla.”
The Bench added that the Application was filed for vested interest and though, the Applicant has an alternative remedy, the Application is filed by creating a peerless cause.
Advocates Deepak Khosla and Jaydeep M. Shukla represented the Applicant while Senior Advocate Mihir Joshi and Advocate Keyur Gandhi represented the Respondents.
Facts of the Case
An Application was filed seeking conviction of the Respondents along with the Advocates representing them under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1947. The Applicant alleged and prayed for initiating the contemptuous actions against the Respondents and their Advocates. The first contemptuous action, which was alleged to have occurred on September 30, 2024, pertained to the appearance of the Senior Advocate Mihir Joshi, who was joined and supported on his demand by other Senior Advocates Mihir Thakore and Rashesh Sanjanwala, by alleging that only one senior counsel is permitted to appear in the matter per party and they have appeared on instructions of the Advocate-on-Record (AOR) i.e. Advocate Keyur Gandhi in violation of the ratio of the judgment passed by three Judges Bench in the Case of District Development Officer v. Maniben Virabhai (2000).
Similarly, other five contemptuous actions were alleged by the Applicant. Thus, in nutshell, the case of the Applicant was that the Interim Order passed in a Writ Petition being Special Civil Application No.11679 of 2024 was extended at the request made by the Advocates appearing on behalf of the Respondent - Company, despite an Application filed by the Applicant of vacating Interim Order under the provisions of Article 226 (3) of the Constitution of India.
Court’s Observations
The High Court in the above context of the case, observed, “As we have previously recorded, the present application is epitome of frivolity. Instead of taking a legal and valid recourse of assailing the orders passed by the learned Single Judges in passing the interim orders, the present application appears to have been filed only for the sole reason of mortifying the learned advocates appearing for the respondents and the learned Single Judges.”
The Court noted that serious allegations/aspirations have been cast on the Senior Advocates, Advocates as well as the Single Judges of the High Court in the present proceedings.
“In fact, by contending that the request made by the learned senior counsels and the learned advocates appearing for the respondents in seeking extension of ad interim order is contemptuous, an attempt has been made to cast aspersion on the learned Single Judges of this Court in extending the ad-interim order. Learned advocate Mr.Khosla appears to be ignorant on the law of contempt or rather it appears that a deliberate attempt has been made to demean the functioning of this Court by filing this application by conflating two entirely different issues, though an alternative approach is available”, it further remarked.
The Court said that the Respondents along with their Advocates are tried to be roped in for committing contempt only for the sole reason of requesting the Single Judges to extend the ad-interim relief, and ad hominem attacks are made on the Single Judges, who have extended the interim relief.
“As mentioned hereinabove, there are more than 400 pages, including the memo of the application, which runs into 111 pages incorporating the transcriptions of live-streamed proceedings on the YouTube. Learned advocate Mr.Khosla has strenuously tried to impress this Court by referring to these transcripts”, it also noted.
The Court held that the use of transcription of live streaming Court proceedings cannot be treated as authorized/certified/official version of anything relating to the Court proceedings and the same cannot be allowed to be treated as evidence of anything relating to the Court proceedings and will also be inadmissible, and violation of the mandate of Gujarat High Court (Live Streaming of Court Proceedings) Rules, 2021 will invite proceedings under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.
“Thus, formulation of the transcripts by the applicant from the live streamed videos runs contrary to the mandate of Rule 5 of the aforesaid Rules, and hence, reliance placed on the unauthorized transcripts by learned advocate Mr.Khosla needs to be deprecated and highly condemned, which we do”, it added.
The Court, therefore, concluded that the Application is ill conceived, frivolous, and is filed with an ill-motive to demean the Single Judges and Advocates appearing for the Respondents and hence it deserves to be rejected by imposing exemplary costs.
“The filing of the present application is a sheer wastage of judicial time. Hence, we impose a cost of Rs.2,00,000/- on the applicant, as envisaged under Rule 21 of the Contempt of Courts (Gujarat High Court) Rules, 1984. The same shall be deposited before the Registry of this Court within a period of 02 (two) weeks from the date of pronouncement of this judgment, failing which the matter shall be listed before the Bench assigned the present roster”, it added.
Accordingly, the High Court left it to the discretion of Chief Justice whether the videos of the Court proceedings are required to be removed from the YouTube after a specific period.
Cause Title- Gujarat Operational Creditors Association Acting Through Priti Chaudhary v. Arcelor Mittal Nippon Steel India Ltd. & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2025:GUJHC:7382-DB)
Appearance:
Applicant: Advocates Deepak Khosla and Jaydeep M. Shukla.
Respondents: Senior Advocate Mihir Joshi, Advocates Keyur Gandhi, and Yash Dadhich.
