Imposes Rs 50K Costs On Petitioners, Says Duty Of The Courts To Weed Out Them At Onset
Srinagar, Jul 14: Observing that it is duty of the Courts to weed out frivolous and vexatious litigation at its outset as the same among others steals valuable time of courts, the High Court of J&K and Ladakh on Friday imposed Rs 50000 as costs on petitioners from Kargil .
“It is true that the Courts should not be hypersensitive in discharge of their functions, but that does not mean and imply that they should become mute spectators to the attempts made by the unscrupulous litigants, who approach the Courts only, with a view to abusing the process of law,” a bench of Justice Sanjeev Kumar said, adding, “It is, thus, the duty of the Courts to ensure that frivolous and vexatious litigation is weeded out at its outset, so that it does not come in the way of a genuine litigant seeking justice from what they treat as ‘Temple of Justice’.”
It said that small and non-existent issues, “enlarged with a zeal to protract the litigation and avoid unsavoury results as also to drag the opposite party in false and frivolous litigation” causes sheer waste of court’s valuable time.
“Such frivolous litigation cannot be simply ignored as it does not come without consequences of harassing parties, abusing the process of law, stealing valuable court’s time and unjust deviation of Court concern from pending litigation,” the court said, adding, “There is no denying the fact that Indian litigation system though most efficient is commonly battling the image of “delay” which has far reaching consequences in the time of globalization and make in India.”
The court made the observations while dismissing a petition with regard to partition of an estate left by a person in Kargil. The matter, as observed by the court, is pending before Deputy Commissioner Kargil.
“The matters like the title to the land, partition and distribution of shares amongst the co-sharers etc., cannot be decided without making reference to the revenue record,” the court said, adding, “The Deputy Commissioner, Kargil, who is seized of the partition proceedings is well within his right to call for reports from the concerned Revenue Officers to know the exact status of the subject property as reflected in the revenue records.”
The court said that the petitioners or any other party to the proceedings are/is equally well within their/his right to object to such report and persuade the Deputy Commissioner not to accept it.
“….they (petitioners) have come to this Court only to ensure that the proceedings are somehow protracted. The protraction of the proceedings obviously helps the petitioners, who claimably are in possession of the subject property.”
The court said no effective order has been so far passed by the Deputy Commissioner, Kargil, nor any proceedings adverse to the interest of the petitioners have taken place.
“The petitioners, if, at any stage, are aggrieved of some order, interim or final, passed by the Deputy Commissioner, Kargil, is entitled to file an appeal or revision before the Competent Authority,” the court said, adding, “The Land Revenue Act provides a complete mechanism for redressal of grievances. There is complete hierarchy of the Revenue Officers in the Act which, inter alia, contains the provision for appeal and revision by the higher Authorities against the orders passed by the Revenue Officers subordinate to them.”
The Constitutional Court, the Bench said, cannot be approached on the “slightest provocation, more so, when equally efficacious alternative statutory remedies are provided in the statute.” “The process of law cannot be permitted to be abused by a litigant only for the reason that he has financial resources to straightway approach the Court bypassing all the statutory remedies available to him,” the court said and dismissed the petition with an “exemplary cost of Rs.50,000/-, to be deposited by the petitioners in the Advocates’ Welfare Fund within a period of four weeks.”
