The Delhi High Court has imposed a cost of Rs two lakh on a 84-year-old man and issued contempt notice for seeking the recall of an order on the ground that his counsel had cheated him by withdrawing his appeal.
Justice Valmiki J Mehta also rapped the man, saying it is high time that courts should send out a strong message to dishonest litigants by imposing heaviest of costs.
"This court knows that it is 'kalyug'. Not only it is kalyug, we are at a deep end in kalyug. In such age and time, surely it is not inconvenient and unknown for litigants to make totally false allegations against an earlier counsel ....
"This court does not accept anything else from dishonest litigants and who would go to any lengths to take favourable orders from the courts," the bench noted. As per Sanskrit scriptures, Kalyug is last of the four stages the world goes through and is associated with strife, discord and quarrel.
Octogenarian Bachan Singh Kumar's appeals were dismissed in 2014 as not pressed, recording the submission of his counsel, by giving time to him to vacate a building in South Delhi's East of Kailash area before the end of 2016.
However, in January this year, he came with an application seeking recall of the order stating that his earlier counsel cheated and defrauded him by taking signatures on the affidavit of undertaking. He also had approached Bar Council complaining against the lawyer.
The court said it disbelieved and rejected the dishonest averments of the appellant and said "obviously, the month of January 2017 is a convenient statement because time to vacate the suit premises expired on December 31, 2016"
The court imposed a cost of Rs two lakh and issued a contempt notice.
"The facts of the present case also persuade me to issue a notice of contempt against the applicant/appellant in spite of the fact that today the applicant/appellant is 84 years of age because it is high time that, irrespective of age, gross dishonesty is taken note of and acted upon strongly by this court," the court added.
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