K SHRIMAN NARAYANA Vs. S MARIYAPPA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE present complaint filed under Art. 215 of the Constitution of India in-volves a simple but important question of law as regards the jurisdiction of the High Courts in India to initiate proceedings for alleged contempt of the Supreme Court.

(2.) THE complaint is directed against the Addl. City Civil Judge, Metropolitan Area, Bangalore. The allegation levelled against him is that, in his order dated 6th March, 1997 passed in O. S. 3272/96 on an I. A. filed under Order 39, Rules 1 and 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure, he had made certain observations about the order dated 6-2-1996 passed by the Supreme Court in Civil Appeal No. 1489/98, which according to the complainant is unwarranted and lowers the prestige of the Apex Court.

(3.) AT the instance of the complainant, notices were issued to the respondent as well as the State of Karnataka who are respectively represented by Sri. H. S. Jois, learned Senior Advocate and Sri. B. R. Nanjundaiah, learned State Public Prosecutor who have taken objection to the maintainability of the present complaint on the very ground of jurisdiction of this Court to entertain the same. Learned counsel appearing on both sides have taken us through the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 ('act' for short) and Articles 129 and 215 of the Constitution of India which read as under :-