Srinagar: The Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh High Court on Friday passed an order of exemplary cost of Rs 50,000 on a Kargil-based petitioner for filing a “frivolous case”.
The case titled Cho Cho Shazia V/s UT of Ladakh related to a land dispute in Kargil district of Ladakh wherein the petitioners had approached the concerned Deputy Commissioner (DC)/collector for settlement of their differences.
The petitioners, however, without waiting for the certified copies to be supplied by the DC, rushed to the High Court. They even got the proceedings before the DC stayed.
Hearing the case, Justice Sanjeev Kumar observed that the petitioners rushed to this court. “They even got the proceedings before the deputy commissioner, Kargil stayed. Such is the extent of frivolity in the submissions made by the learned senior counsel appearing for the petitioners,” he said.
Less said the better, the judge said and found the petition to be “totally frivolous and vexatious” and accordingly, dismissed it. However the judge ordered the dismissal 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.
The judge observed that it is true “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.”
He said 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’. This, he said, would protect the precious public and judicial time.
