Sreya Kanugula
The Supreme Court made the observation that before giving a punishment to someone who didn’t comply with a court decision, the satisfaction of disobeying whichever judgment, decree or direction or writ along with the satisfaction of the disobedience being wilful as well as intentional, must be gained by the Court.
The bench consisting of Justices AM Khanwilkar and BR Gavai gave this observation while concluding the contempt petition case of Rama Narang v. Ramesh Narang which was filed in the year 2008.
The petition had arisen out of a familial conflict between a father and the two sons he had with his first wife. The allegation was made that the party in question had made an attempt of overreaching the Apex Court’s orders in a previous contempt petition. And he had obtained an interim order from the Company Law Board to do so.
The contempt petitioner had alleged that appealing to the CLB’s jurisdiction and the entertainment of these proceedings by the board, itself had amounted to contempt.
The bench had made the observation that contempt of court was not committed by a person if while certain proceedings were pending, he took recourse from other judicial proceedings that were open to him, even if the following proceedings had caused a loss to the other party.
It said that, “It could thus be seen, that this Court has held, that such action of a person which he takes in pursuance of his right to take legal action in a court of law, will not amount to interfering with the course of justice, even though that may require some action on the part of the other party in connection with his own judicial proceedings.”
“The principle is, that a party is free to take action to enforce his legal right. This Court has approved the view taken by Allahabad High Court in Hrishikesh Sanyal v. A.P. Bagchi and Radhey Lal v. Niranjan Nath, that a person does not commit contempt of court if, during the pendency of certain proceedings, he takes recourse to other judicial proceedings open to him, even though the latter proceedings put the other party at a loss.”
The bench had continued to explain the scope of proceedings under the matter of contempt and had given the observation that only disobedience of wilful nature towards “any judgment, decree, direction, writ or other process” will be considered as contempt of Court.
The court said, “It can thus be seen, that this Court has held, that the contempt proceeding is not like an execution proceeding under the Code of Civil Procedure… Though, the civil court while executing a decree against the judgment-debtor is not concerned and bothered as to whether the disobedience to any judgment or decree was wilful, and once the decree had been passed, it was the duty of the court to execute the decree, whatever may be the consequences thereof.”
“In a contempt proceeding, before a contemnor is held guilty and punished, the Court has to record a finding, that such disobedience was willful and intentional. It has been held, that if from the circumstances of a particular case, though the Court is satisfied that there has been a disobedience but such disobedience is the result of some compelling circumstances, under which it is not possible for the contemnor to comply with the same, the Court may not punish the alleged contemnor.”
The court further added that proceedings of such nature would be considered quasi-criminal and the required standard for proof would be to that extent as well. It also said that the alleged contemnor would stay entitled to all the provisions and safeguards or rights given under criminal jurisprudence, which includes the benefit of the doubt.
It was clarified by the bench that there must be an intentional case of clear-cut obstruction of administrating justice by the alleged party to bring this matter underneath the ambit of this provision.
The Court had also made references to their former observations from the Debabrata Bandopadbyay and Others v. State of West Bengal and Another case, in which the observation of the punishment given with regards to the law of contempt was called for when the error made was deliberate and with disregard to one’s duty and in defiance of authority.
Then it proceeded to conclude and end the contempt petition after making the observation that the case of ‘willful, deliberate, and intentional disobedience’ of any of the Court’s given directions or breaching any of the Court’s given undertakings had not been made out in the case.