D C M LIMITED Vs. LT GOVERNOR DELHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Eight contemners have been proceeded against by order of this Court dted 4 March 1994 undersection 14 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 ('the Act' for short), and Article 215 of the Constitution for having committed criminal contempt. As to what 'criminal contempt' means, it will be useful to refer to its definition in clause (c) of section 2 of the Act, which is as under :-

(2.) As to what is a court of record, we may refer to a decision of the Supreme Court in Re: Under Article 143 of the Constitution (AIR 1965 S.C. 745). The court approved the definition of court of record given in Jowitt's Dictionary of English law and said that a court of record was acourt whereof the acts and judicial proceedings were enrolled for perpetual memory and testimony, and which, had the power to fine and imprison for contempt of its authority.

(3.) It all happened on 4 March 1994 when we passed orders on an application filed by the D.C.M. Ltd. (CM 1597/94) seeking modification of our order made earlier on 1 October 1993 to a very limited extent. This order of 1 October 1993 we passed on an application filed by 12 workers' unions against D.C.M. Ltd. and the General Manager Ltd. seeking certain prayers with reference to certain earlier writ proceedings in this Court which had culminated by order of the Supreme Court. That order dated 1 October 1993 also dealt with an appeal (FAO (OS) 217/90) filed by D.C.M. Ltd. against Gaushala Marg Residents Association (Regd) challenging the order of a learned Single Judge allowing an application of the Gaushala Marg Residents Association filed under Order 1 Rule 8of the Code of Civil Procedure in asuit filed by the association against D.C.M. Ltd. The association had prayed for a decree that their members were the tenants with regard to the residential accommodations allotted to them in the residential complex of the D.C.M.Ltd. and then restraining the company from dispossessing them unless otherwise by due process of law. The appeal of the D.C.M. was also allowed by the order dated 1 October 1993 and the application of the association filed under Order 1 Rule 8 of the Code dismissed. C.M. 5695/93 was filed in C.W.P. 2476/88. Another association called the D.C.M. Residents and Shopkeepers (Regd), also a society registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860, filed an application (C.M. 6482/93) seeking to be impleaded as aparty in the proceedings arising out of C.M. 5695/93. This application was also dismissed by order dated } October 1993. In C.M. 5695/93 the 12 workers' unions whose compendious name was Sangarsh Samiti had prayed as under :