LADIES CORNER Vs. STATE OF KARNATAKA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this contempt of Court Case, the accused No. 2 is one Sri K. S. Ullasa son of K. M. Somappa, Circle Inspector of Police, Yeshwanthpur Sub-Division, Bangalore-22 (hereinafter called the accused). State of Karnataka is arrayed in the contempt petition as Accused No. 1. No offence contempt is alleged against the State of Karnataka. The allegations on which the complaint of contempt was brought, briefly stated, are : that the complainant claimed to be tenant or sub-tenant in occupation of a shop in Bangalore of which the Central Muslim Association was the landlord. The complainant brought a suit in O.S. No. 3214/1982 in the City Civil Court, Bangalore, against the said landlord and sought and obtained an order of temporary injunction dated 4-11-1982 against the complainant's disposession from the shop. Despite this order which was duly communicated both to the landlord and the accused, the latter in contemtuous disregard of that order, proceeded on 6-11-1982 to lock and seal the shop thereby nullifying the court's order but passed an order of his own dated 9-11-1982 by which he virtually granted a counter-injunction in favour of the landlord and ordered that complainant shall not to enter upon the shop. To complete the narration, it would be necessary to notice that the landlord had claimed to have resorted to extra- judicial resumption of possession with the help of the some police of the same police station on 30-10-1982. There were some protests against the acts of the police and the Accused had issued notices to the parties to appear before him. It was then that the complainant filed the suit and obtained the possessary remedy of an order of injunction. But the accused instead of taking his hands-off the matter when once a judicial order, inter parties, had supervened, persisted in his own proceedings, sealed the shop and passed an order dated 9-11-1 982 granting virtually an injunction against the complainant. The judicial order became ineffective. The accursed, thought that the complainant had obtained the order of injunction suppressing truth and directed prosecution of the complainant, even before his case was examined by the Civil Court. The learned Government Advocate who originally entered appearance for the 2nd accused frankly stated that the conduct of the 2nd accused-police officer could not be defended. However, as the second-accused wanted to defend his action and sought -and was granted-leave to engage another counsel of his choice. That is how Sri M. R. Janardhana, learned counsel entered appearance for the accused. Sri S. V. Jagannath, learned Government Advocate who appeared for the Government which had also been impleaded in the proceedings, submitted that the Government does not defend the action of the accused. However, as the accused sought to justify his action and desired to defend himself, the matter had to be tried and decided on the merits. The Charges framed under Section 12 of the Contempt of Court Act, 1971, (hereinafter referred to as the 'Act' were :

(2.) The accused pleaded not guilty. He was tried. In support of the charges, four witnesses-P.Ws. 1 to 4 are examined and the documents are produced by the complainant. The accused led defence evidence and examined four witnesses -D.Ws. 1 to 4-and produced one document. In addition to this, the complainant and the accused hava produced certain documents along with the complaint and the objections respectively. One of thorn is the order dated 9-11 -1982 bearing No. YSD/CC/1271 /82 passed by the accused. This order is the basis for the second charge.

(3.) We have heard Sri K. G. Ragha- van, learned counsel for the complainant and Sri M R. Janardhana, learned counsel for the accused. We have been taken through the allegations of the complaint and the defence of the accused as reflected from the complaint, and the objections and the evidence on record.