ANANDAN Vs. MURALI AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Challenging the award passed in Lok Adalat, the petitioner/plaintiff came up with this writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India mainly on the reason that the parties to the suit have not affixed their signature in the operative portion of the award produced and marked as Exhibit P1. It is having two pages. One is the award passed with date 05.06.2015, signed by the Munsiff being the Judicial member and one Advocate being the member of Adalat constituted by District Legal Services Authority. The second page is a printed format with the title 'Lok Adalat held on the 5th day of June 2015 at Thrissur, organized by the District Legal Services Authority'. The name of party to the suit and the suit number were also entered. But, the settlement arrived at by the parties was not incorporated anywhere in the said printed format. The signature of all the parties to the suit is seen affixed in the said printed format except the second defendant. It is too unfortunate that a separate award is seen annexed to the printed form without having the signatures of the parties to the suit. I am also at a loss to understand how such an award was passed without the juncture of second defendant. All basic principles governing the conduct of Lok Adalat have been overlooked while passing the award unilaterally by the judicial member along with a non judicial member (Advocate) without the juncture of parties to the suit. The award passed is extracted below for reference:"O.S.491/2010

(2.) In the above said award none of the parties to the suit affixed their signature. It is seen prepared by the judicial member and a non judicial member unilaterally. But, in the printed format of Adalat, the award passed is entirely different. It is in the following lines:-

(3.) It seems to be so strange that in a partition suit, that too at the stage of passing of final decree, an award has been passed stating that "the entire liability of the defendants with regard to the said A/c shall stand discharged". The parties therein are referred as Creditor/petitioner and debtors/respondents. In effect, there are two different awards. One is signed by the parties and the other is prepared by the judicial member along with a non judicial member, without the signature of parties to the suit. Both are contradictions and inconsistent.