HC dismisses PIL with Rs 50,000 cost

A public interest litigation (PIL) is a weapon that has to be used with great care and circumspection and the judiciary has to be extremely careful to see that behind the beautiful veil of public interest an ugly private malice, vested interest or public interest seeking is not lurking. It is to be used as an effective weapon in the armory of law for delivering social justice to citizens.

The HP High Court upheld while dismissing a PIL filed by a retired professor and Chairman of the Umang Foundation with Rs 50,000 cost.

While imposing the cost, a Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Tarlok Singh Chauhan and Justice Satyen Vaidya observed, “The petitioner being a retired professor was not expected to succumb to spasmodic sentiments and behave like a knight errant roaming at will in pursuit of issues providing publicity. For, it is settled that even a good cause can be lost if the petitions are filed on half-baked information without proper research as this could have serious effect on third party rights lying in the instant case.”

The court passed the judgment on a letter written by the retired professor and Chairman of the Umang Foundation to the Chief Justice alleging therein that he was informed by Uday Sharma and his father Hem Chand Sharma (telephonically) about the thrashings, torture and misbehaviour at the Observation Home at Hira Nagar by the staff of the ashram.

Taking note of the issue raised by him, the court had converted the letter into a criminal PIL and sought response from the authorities concerned. But eventually all allegations set out in the petition were found not to be true. Meanwhile, damage to the private respondent(s) was already done because consequent upon the issuance of a notice by this court, as a knee jerk reaction, services of the Superintendent of the Observation Home, Hira Nagar, were terminated and on account of wide publicity, his reputation and image in society unduly came to be maligned.

While dismissing the petition, the court observed, “The only inference that this court can draw is that the letter in question was addressed to it solely for the purpose of publicity and, therefore, the same was not bona fide but a publicity interest litigation.”

It stated, “The petitioner to say the least has been negligent and reckless in indirectly besmirching the character of others more particularly, employees who have unnecessarily been dragged into this litigation and on account of this petition have suffered untold humiliation, miseries and sufferings.”