Parties need to be careful while filing pleadings with registry to avoid disastrous errors: Supreme Court

Litigants need to be careful while filing the pleadings in their cases with the court registry to avoid disastrous errors, the Supreme Court recently cautioned [Tehsildar Urban Improvement Trust and anr vs Ganga Bai Menariya and ors]..A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Rajesh Bindal made the observation while disposing of a civil case, in which the Court noted that the parties had not placed on record the correct order copies of the fora below."We can only observe that the parties need to be more careful while filing the pleadings in this Court and so the Registry of this Court as any error therein may be disastrous for any of the parties," the bench stated..The case before the Court concerned a property dispute. A civil suit had initially been filed for permanent injunction, ownership and possession of certain property. A trial court dismissed the suit. However, the first appellate court allowed an appeal against the trial court's dismissal and decreed the suit. The Rajasthan High Court upheld the first appellate court's order which restrained the defendants from interfering with the plaintiffs' possession of the disputed land.The defendants (appellants before the Supreme Court) then challenged the High Court's order before the Supreme Court..While deciding on the appeal, the Supreme Court criticised the appellants for their "casual" conduct and their failure to place copies of the correct subordinate court records in their pleadings before the top court. "We are pained to note certain facts which show total casualness on the part of the appellants ... When five different suits were filed by different persons while filing the documents with the paper book filed in this Court, it was incumbent upon the appellants to place on record correct copies of the judgments of the Trial Court as well as the First Appellate Court for each of the case ... With great deal of effort to join the loose ends, we could find out the details," the Court said. However, the appeal was ultimately allowed on merits and the trial court's decision to dismiss the civil suit was restored. .Senior Advocate S Niranjan Reddy with advocates C Mohan Rao, Aruna Gupta, Ramesh Allanki, and Syed Ahmad Naqvi appeared for the appellants..[Read Judgment]