Why Karnataka High Court ordered Caste-Income Committee to pay ₹2 lakh costs to a lawyer

The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday strongly criticised and imposed exemplary costs on members of the district income and caste verification committee in Hassan for delaying the issuance of a validity certificate to a woman lawyer who needed it to finalise her appointment as an Additional Public Prosecutor (APP) [Muthulaxmi BN v. State of Karnataka and ors].

Justice M Nagaprasanna ordered the committee members to personally pay these costs to the lawyer within four weeks, after objecting to how the authority had stalled the process of issuing the certificate.

"It is a case where the members of the Committee must be mulcted with exemplary cost ... The cost not to be paid by State, but by the Members of the District Caste and Income Verification Committee, Hassan District, headed by the Deputy Commissioner at the relevant point in time from their pockets. Imposition of exemplary cost has become necessary in the peculiar facts of the case, not only to recompense the petitioner, but become a cautionary call to all those who hold public office, that dereliction cloaked in ignorance shall find no refuge before this Court," the judge said.

The district committee had declined to issue the validity certificate by stating that the lawyer’s husband’s income went beyond the permissible threshold.

However, Justice Nagaprasanna pointed out that courts have time and again held that it is the father’s income that is the determining criterion, not the husband’s income.

"12 months passed by, all for ignorance of law by the State Government in deliberate defiance of law ... coordinate Benches of this Court had held that caste and income certificate would always depend on father’s income and not the income of the husband," it said.

The Court also took exception to the committee finally giving the certificate by saying that the High Court had ordered it to do so, instead of acknowledging that it was supposed to have issued the certificate in the first place.

It, therefore, ordered the committee members to personally pay exemplary costs of ₹ 2 lakhs to the lawyer for their lapses.

The Court passed the order after noting that it was not the first time that the State authorities had compelled people to approach the courts in such cases.

Further, in this case, the lawyer's appointment of an APP was significantly delayed because of the committee's conduct. The judge noted that the lawyer was left to knock on bureaucratic doors "until her knuckles bled with frustration", compelling her to eventually approach the Court for relief.

It was only upon the Court's intervention that her certificate was issued, which should have been hers by right, the judge further noted.

"(It was earlier observed that) it was high time the State set its house in order and refrain from generating unnecessary litigation. The State, as it is known for its wont, has again repeated the same mistake…. the State in willful ignorance or negligent defiance, clung to the misbegotten interpretation, imputing the income of the spouse to determine the backwardness of a woman, born into an eligible category…The attitude of the State cannot be countenanced ... justice delayed is justice dented. For 12 long months, while others from the same select list stepped into service, the petitioner languished in anxious limbo," the July 8 ruling said further.

Advocate AR Sharadamba represented the petitioner-lawyer.

High Court Government Pleader Spoorthy Hegde represented the respondent-authorities.

[Read Order]