Disposed

Smt Garima Sauda, Sr Civil Judge and Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sojat, Pali v. Goverdhan Singh

Rajasthan HC11 Jan 2022CRLCP/1/2020

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

The High Court of Rajasthan held that an advocate's Facebook comments criticizing judicial delays did not amount to contempt of court under Section 2(c) of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, and terminated the contempt proceedings without any specific design or plan to interfere with justice.

What did the court decide?

The contempt proceedings are terminated.

Smt Garima Sauda, Sr Civil Judge and… — Constitutional and Fundamental Rights | Rajasthan HC (2022)

¶1

HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE FOR RAJASTHAN AT JODHPUR

¶2

D.B. Criminal Contempt Petition No. 1/2020

¶3

Smt Garima Sauda, Sr Civil Judge And Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sojat, Pali, Aged About 36 Years, By Caste Charan, At Present Sr. Civil Judge And Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sojat, Pali, Rajasthan..

¶4

----Petitioner

¶5

Versus

¶6

Goverdhan Singh, Advocate, Mobile No. 9828090666, R/o Unknown.

¶7

U.P. Singh, R/o Unknown.

¶8

Bhawani Singh Janwa, R/o Unknown.

¶9

Bhagwan Singh Shekhawat, R/o Unknown.

¶10

Punam Chand Nen Bana, R/o Unknown.

¶11

Rajesh Balwada, R/o Unknown.

¶12

Mahaveer Po., R/o Unknown.

¶13

S.R. Khemka Swami, R/o Unknown.

¶14

----Respondents

¶15

For Petitioner(s) : Mr. Sandeep Shah, AAG through VC For Respondent(s) : Mr. Goverdhan Singh, respondent No. 1 present in person through VC

¶16

HON'BLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE MR. AKIL KURESHI HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE REKHA BORANA

¶17

Order

¶18

11/01/2022

¶19

The contempt proceedings arise out of the petition filed by the judicial officer urging that contempt action be taken against the present respondent No. 1, who is a practicing advocate. The case of the judicial officer is that in relation to a criminal case which was pending before her, the respondent No. 1 had made highly objectionable comment on his facebook page. Several

¶20

(2 of 3) [CRLCP-1/2020]

¶21

people responded to this comment, which responses were also objectionable and contemptuous.

¶22

We have perused the facebook post of the respondent and heard Shri Sandeep Shah, Additional Advocate General who was appointed as Amicus Curiae and the respondent no.1 who appears in person.

¶23

The facebook post in question refers to various dates on which the criminal case was posted from time to time. Thereafter, the author of the post i.e. respondent no.1 herein has stated that after several dates, no justice is being done. Whether the complaint had to be registered as F.I.R. or not is all that was required to be decided. Thereafter, he has made following remarks:-

¶24

“ Had asked for justice and got only unlimited

¶25

adjournments ”.

¶26

In our opinion, the action of the respondent no.1 does not amount to contempt of court in any manner. The criminal contempt has been defined in Section 2(c) of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 as to mean the publication of any matter or the doing of any other act whatsoever which scandalises or tends to scandalise, or lowers or tends to lower the authority of, any court; or prejudices, or interferes or tends to interfere with, the due course of any judicial proceeding; or interferes or tends to interfere with, or obstructs or tends to obstruct, the administration of justice in any other manner. The remarks of the respondent were in the nature of stating that a particular proceedings had lingered on before the Court for unduly long period of time. That by itself in isolation cannot be seen as contemptuous. The reference to the remarks of several other people in response to

¶27

(3 of 3)

¶28

[CRLCP-1/2020]

¶29

this post which may be highly objectionable would not turn the action of the present respondent contemptuous, unless a specific design or plan is shown to be in existence.

¶30

Under the circumstances, we see no reason to pursue these contempt proceedings any further. The same are terminated.

¶31

(REKHA BORANA),J (AKIL KURESHI),CJ 8-Mak/-

Smt Garima Sauda, Sr Civil Judge and Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sojat, Pali v. Goverdhan Singh

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

Smt Garima Sauda, Sr Civil Judge and Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Sojat, Pali v. Goverdhan Singh

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

What the court decided

A compact analysis

Issues for consideration

Statutes considered

Parties & counsel

Coram

Case details

Similar cases

Managing Committee Vs Ghanshyam Sharma S/O Late Shri Ganga Bux Sharma

Managing Committee, Agarwal Senior Secondary School Vs Rajesh Chandra Sharma S/O Dr. Anand Bihari Sharma

Managing Committee, D.A.V. Sr. Secondary School Vs Sudha Gupta W/O Shri Rakesh Kumar Gupta

Basanti Lal Bohra HUF Vs State of Rajasthan

Dental Surgeon Medical Teacher Association Vs Union of India

Sumer Singh Vs Union of India