Judicial propriety demands respect for order passed by coordinate bench of High Court: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Monday noted that judicial propriety demands respect for the order passed by a Bench of coordinate strength of a High Court (UP Jal Vidyut Nigam v. Balbir Singh).

. The Bench of Justices MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose was dealing with a case where the Allahabad High Court had granted liberty to the appellants to withdraw a case and approach the Uttarakhand High Court since the labour court involved in the case fell under the jurisdiction of the latter after the creation of Uttarakhand in 2000.

. The facts of the case are that an aggrieved employee had approached a labour court in Dehradun after being terminated. His termination was held to be illegal in 1997 and back wages were directed to be paid. This order was appealed before the Allahabad High Court, which stayed the labour court order but directed the amount to be deposited with the labour court.

The appeal was taken up again in 2014. However, by then, the State of Uttarakhand came into being. Accordingly, the High Court granted the appellant liberty to withdraw the case and approach the Uttarakhand High Court in a fresh plea.

However, the Uttarakhand High Court dismissed the plea, stating that the liberty should have been granted by the Chief Justice of Allahabad High Court and no one else as per the Uttar Pradesh Reorganisation Act. This prompted an appeal before the Supreme Court.

. Criticising the conduct of the Uttarakhand High Court while setting aside its order of dismissal, the apex court stated that "learned Single Judge of the High Court of Uttarakhand is not at all justified in making comments upon the judicial order passed by the Coordinate Bench of the Allahabad High Court."

. " The Single Judge of the High Court of Uttarakhand was not acting as an appellate court against the judicial order passed by the High Court of Allahabad permitting the appellants to withdraw the writ petition with liberty to file a writ petition before an appropriate court. Judicial discipline/propriety demand to respect the order passed by the Coordinate Bench and more particularly the judicial order passed by the Coordinate Bench of the High Court, in the present case the Allahabad High Court which as such was not under challenge before it," reads the judgment.

. It was also held that the appropriate court in this case would be the High Court of Uttarakhand, and therefore, there was no error committed by the Allahabad High Court in permitting the appellants to withdraw the writ petition pending before it with the liberty to file a fresh writ petition before the Uttarakhand High Court.

. The top court further opined that an order passed under Sub Section (2) of Section 35 of the Reorganisation Act by the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court for transfer of pending matters to the High Court of Uttarakhand is an administrative order.

"If that power was not exercised and subsequently it was found that proceedings which were required to be transferred in exercise of power SubSection (2) of Section 35 of the Act, has not been transferred, it does not preclude the High Court of Allahabad to pass a judicial order and that too permitting the appellants to withdraw the writ petition pending before it and to file it before an appropriate court," stated the top court.

. The Bench thus restored the plea in the Uttarakhand High Court and requested it to expeditiously dispose of the case, preferably within six months.

. [Read Judgment]

Judicial propriety demands respect for order passed by coordinate bench of High Court: Supreme Court

Debayan Roy

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