KANAKA RAJ MEHTA Vs. K V SHIVAKUMAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this complaint presented under Article 215 of the Constitution of India read with Sections 11 and 12 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 (the Act for short) in which the complainant complains that respondent No. 1 has failed to comply with the directions issued to him by this Court in W.P. No. 33040/1982, DR. H.L. Thimme gowda v. Deputy Commissioner - DD 8 -5 -1986, in view of the preliminary objections raised by the 1st respondent, the following question of law arises for consideration:

(2.) THE facts of the case, in brief are these: - There have been number of Writ Petitions including public interest petitions presented before this Court questioning the legality of the lease of a very valuable site located in the most important business locality of Bangalore City belonging to the State Government to the 1st respondent. In one of the Writ Petitions (W.P. No. 15996/ 1981) there was also an interim order directing the 1st respondent not to construct the building. But it so happened the 1st respondent despite the said order managed to construct the building. The history of the case and as to how the 1st respondent managed to put up the construction are fully set out in S.K. SHARMA v. CORPORATION OF THE CITY OF BANGALORE, I.L.R. 1986 KAR 2536 and the order made in W.P. No. 33040/1982 in which the legality of the lease in favour of the 1st respondent was considered, out of which the present complaint arises. The Court came to the conclusion that the decision of the Government to lease the site to the 1st respondent suffered from serious illegalities and was an act of favouritism in favour of the 1st respondent. However, as the building had already been constructed and as the 1st respondent gave an undertaking that instead of the monthly rental of Rs. 16,350/ - for which the site was leased to the 1st respondent, he would pay rent at the rate of Rs. 25,000/ - per month from the date of lease of the site, instead of quashing the lease in favour of the 1st respondent, a direction was issued to the 1st respondent, who was respondent -3 in the said Writ Petition. The relevant portion of the Judgment in W.P. No. 33040/1982 I.L.R. 1986 KAR 2536 reads:

(3.) SRI K.R.O. Karanth, learned Counsel for the 1st respondent, however, has raised a preliminary objection to the maintainability of the petition relying upon Section 20 of the Contempt of Courts Act. The said Section reads: -