# " v. THE STATE OF U.P. & ANR

- **Citation:** [1969] 1 S.C.R. 115
- **Court:** Supreme Court of India
- **Decided:** 1968-04-24
- **Source:** https://unisonlegal.in/judgment/supreme-court-of-india/v-the-state-of-u-p-anr-4373
- **Pages:** 7

## Headnote

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BUNNA PRASAD AND ORS.
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"
v.
THE STATE OF U.P. & ANR.
April 24, 1968
(S. M. SIKRI, J. M. SHELAT AND V. BHARGAVA, JJ.].
Contempt of Courts Ad, 1952, ss. 4 and 5-A.ccused app/yin11 to
Panchayat not to proceed Nith matter because of stay order 11ranted .by
High Court-No proper affidavit or other evidence to support appl1cation-Panchayat disbelieving applicant and continuing trial-If guilty of
contempt-Whether bound to adjourn for better proof.
M, an accused person in
centain proceedings
pending before
the
Nyaya Panchayat filed a petition under Art. 227 in the High Court and
obtained a stay of the proceedings 011 December 20, 1963. Thereafter
when the Panchayat met to proceed with the matter, be made an application supported by a document purporting to be an affidavit stating that
the High Court had admitted his writ petition and had stayed further
proceedings before the Panchayat; and that therefore nothing further
should be don.e in the matter. However, the, Panchayat did not allow
his application and proceeded <to hold M and others guilty and imposing
fines on them.
M, thereafter filed an applioation under ss. 4 and 5 of the Contempt
of C-Ourts Act, 1952, alleging contempt of the High C-Ourt by the Pan"
chayat. An affidavit filed before the High Court by the Sarpanch stated
that the document filed by M, by way of an affidavit in support of his
application had not been verified by any proper authority and . for this
and other reasons the Panchayat did not believe that the High Court had
stayed the proceedings.
The High Court held the members of the Panchayat guilty of contempt and observed that if they wanted to ascertainthe matter, they should have at best stayed the proceedings for a short
while and asked the applicant to produce a certified copy of the stay
order; in not doing so. the Panchas had obviously not acted bona fide and
their action amounted to wilful disobedience of the High Court's order.
On appeal to this Court,
HELD : The appeal must be allowed and the judgment and order of
the High Court set aside.
The only material before the Panchayat was the
application
dated
December 25, 1963. which was not supported by ·any affidavit sworn to
before a pe.rson authorised to administer oaths.
Further, the application
did not contain the date of the order; even a copy of the telegram stated
to have been setl.t by M's advocate in the High Court was not attached
to the application. On this material the hona {ides of the Panchas could
not be doubted if they refused to accept the mere statement of the party
that the High Court had stayed the proceedings before them. In such
matters those· who assert that a person had knowledge of the order must
prove this fact beyond all reasonable doubt.
If there is any doubt. the
benefit ought to be given to 4he person charged with contempt of court.
(120 F-H; 121 A-BJ
H
It is trne that in certain cases proceedings can be adjourned to enable
the parties to file better proof. but a judicial officer is not bound ito do
so and, if the bona fide does not in his discretion adjourn. proceedings,
it cannot be said that .he has committed contempt of court. [121 C-D]
•
116
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
• [1969) I S.C.R.
. CRIMINAL APPELLATE JuR1so1cnoN: Criminal Appeal No.
112 of 1965.
:\Prcal by special leave from the jurisdiction and order dated
Apnl 29, 1965 of the Allahabad High Court in Criminal Misc.
Contempt Case No. 43 of .1965.
A. S. R. Chari, M. K. Ramamurthi, Vineet Kumar and
Shyamala Pappu, for the appe!lants.
0. P. Rana, for respondent No. J.
J. I'. Gova/, V. C. Prasar and S. P. Singh for respondent
No. 2.

## Text

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,
A
BUNNA PRASAD AND ORS.
B
c
D
F
G
"
v.
THE STATE OF U.P. & ANR.
April 24, 1968
(S. M. SIKRI, J. M. SHELAT AND V. BHARGAVA, JJ.].
Contempt of Courts Ad, 1952, ss. 4 and 5-A.ccused app/yin11 to
Panchayat not to proceed Nith matter because of stay order 11ranted .by
High Court-No proper affidavit or other evidence to support appl1cation-Panchayat disbelieving applicant and continuing trial-If guilty of
contempt-Whether bound to adjourn for better proof.
M, an accused person in
centain proceedings
pending before
the
Nyaya Panchayat filed a petition under Art. 227 in the High Court and
obtained a stay of the proceedings 011 December 20, 1963. Thereafter
when the Panchayat met to proceed with the matter, be made an application supported by a document purporting to be an affidavit stating that
the High Court had admitted his writ petition and had stayed further
proceedings before the Panchayat; and that therefore nothing further
should be don.e in the matter. However, the, Panchayat did not allow
his application and proceeded <to hold M and others guilty and imposing
fines on them.
M, thereafter filed an applioation under ss. 4 and 5 of the Contempt
of C-Ourts Act, 1952, alleging contempt of the High C-Ourt by the Pan"
chayat. An affidavit filed before the High Court by the Sarpanch stated
that the document filed by M, by way of an affidavit in support of his
application had not been verified by any proper authority and . for this
and other reasons the Panchayat did not believe that the High Court had
stayed the proceedings.
The High Court held the members of the Panchayat guilty of contempt and observed that if they wanted to ascertainthe matter, they should have at best stayed the proceedings for a short
while and asked the applicant to produce a certified copy of the stay
order; in not doing so. the Panchas had obviously not acted bona fide and
their action amounted to wilful disobedience of the High Court's order.
On appeal to this Court,
HELD : The appeal must be allowed and the judgment and order of
the High Court set aside.
The only material before the Panchayat was the
application
dated
December 25, 1963. which was not supported by ·any affidavit sworn to
before a pe.rson authorised to administer oaths.
Further, the application
did not contain the date of the order; even a copy of the telegram stated
to have been setl.t by M's advocate in the High Court was not attached
to the application. On this material the hona {ides of the Panchas could
not be doubted if they refused to accept the mere statement of the party
that the High Court had stayed the proceedings before them. In such
matters those· who assert that a person had knowledge of the order must
prove this fact beyond all reasonable doubt.
If there is any doubt. the
benefit ought to be given to 4he person charged with contempt of court.
(120 F-H; 121 A-BJ
H
It is trne that in certain cases proceedings can be adjourned to enable
the parties to file better proof. but a judicial officer is not bound ito do
so and, if the bona fide does not in his discretion adjourn. proceedings,
it cannot be said that .he has committed contempt of court. [121 C-D]
•
116
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
• [1969) I S.C.R.
. CRIMINAL APPELLATE JuR1so1cnoN: Criminal Appeal No.
112 of 1965.
:\Prcal by special leave from the jurisdiction and order dated
Apnl 29, 1965 of the Allahabad High Court in Criminal Misc.
Contempt Case No. 43 of .1965.
A. S. R. Chari, M. K. Ramamurthi, Vineet Kumar and
Shyamala Pappu, for the appe!lants.
0. P. Rana, for respondent No. J.
J. I'. Gova/, V. C. Prasar and S. P. Singh for respondent
No. 2.
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by
· Sikri, J. This appeal by special leave is directed against the
judgment of the Allahabad High Court adjudging the five appellants guilty of contempt of court and sentencing each of them to
pay a fine of Rs. 1,000/- and further ordering that in c<Lse of
default they shall undergo simple imprisonment for two weeks.
The High Court held that the five appellants had
disobeyed an
order of stay passed by it staying proceedings pending before the
Nyaya Panchayat, Jokha Khas, District Deoria.
The relevant facts arc these. On September 2, 1963. Yashoda,
son of Raj Kumar, filed a complaint before the Nyaya Panchayat,
Jokha Khas, against Jagdeo. Mahabir and Laxmi alleging that
he had been abused and belaboured and his property worth
Rs. 40/- damaged. On September 10, 1963. the Nyaya Panchayat assembled
and evidence was
led
before it.
The case
was adjourned to December 25, 1963. On October 11. 1963,
Mahabir. accused. made an application under s. 85 of the U.P.
Panchayat Raj Act, 1947. to S.D.M., Deoria, to transfer the
proceedings on the ground that the complainant Yashoda was
father of Bunna Prasad, Sarpanch of Nyaya Panchayat, Jokha
Khas.
On November 28, 1963, the S.D.M. rejected this application.
On December 13. 1963, a notice was issued to the
five members of the Panchayat to assemble on December 25,
1963. and hear the case.
On December 20, 1963, Mahabir
moved an application under Art. 227 of the Constitution challenging the order of the S.D.M., dated November 28, 1963, and on
the same day the High Court admitted the application and stayed
further proceedings before the Nyaya Panchayat. An urgent copy
of the order was applied for and obtained on that very day and the
counsel sent a telegram in the following words :
"Allahabad He 20
Baldeopd cashier Trust
Sdr GR
Mahabir application admitted stay granted
.
Banwarilal."
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BUNNA PRASAD v. STATE OF U.P. (Sikri, I.)
11 7
It is alleged on the side of the applicant, Mahabir, that immediately after the receipt of the telegram an application accompanied by an affidavit and the telegram of his counsel in the High
Court was presented before the Nyaya Panchayat with the prayer
to stay further proceedings but the Sarpanch refused to take it.
This fact was denied and the High Court seems notto have relied
on this fact in its judgment. It seems to us that it is not proved
on the evidence here that any such application was made before
the Nyaya Panchayat. No application dated December 21, 1963,
which was not accepted by the Nyaya Panchayat, has been produced.
On December 23, 1963, Mahabir submitted an application in
the Court of Shri R. Singh, S.D.M., Deoria, alleging that ''writ
petition has been admitted and a stay order has been issued. But
notwithstanding my informing the Panchayat Adalat of that, I
am not getting any hearing there, and when an application is made
there, it is not entertained." He prayed that the Panchayat Adalat be directed to postpone proceedings pending the receipt of
the stay order.
He produced· the telegram received from the
Advocate before the S.D.M. · In the affidavit accompanying the
application, however, no mention was made about Mahabir .having informed the Panchayat Adalat of the stay order or the fact
that the order and the application was not being entertained by
the Adalat. It happened that the S.D.M. was absent on December 23, 1963, and papers were put up before Shri S. K. Srivastava, Additional Sub-Divisional Magistrate, who issued the order
"Put up with records".· ·Apparently he did not take any further
action till December 26, . 1963. But as the notice against Shri
Srivastava has been discharged by the High Court; · we need not
give any further details about his various orders.
On December 25, 1963, the Nyaya Panchayat met and proceeded to hear the case.
The order sheet reads .thus :
· "Put up today the '25th December, 1963. The com~
plainant and the accused are present. The statements .
of the complainant and his witnesses, Bhabhuti and
Damri, are recorded.
The accused refused to make
statements and put down their signatures. Today, the
25th December, 1963, Mahabir has made an application to the Court and signed· it ·before it. Hence judgment shall be given on 25-12-63."
· .
This order was signed by three Panchas, Phagu Parsad, Jagat
Dubey and Badri Yadav. On the same day a final orqer was made
holding the accused guilty and imposing a fine of Rs. 3/- each
on accused Nos. 1 and 3, and ks. 91- on accused No: 2. The
application of Mahabir, referred'to in the.ordei:, real!S thus:
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118
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
LI 969] 1 s.c.R
Sir,
It is submitted that I have filed a writ petition in the
above ca~e. in the High Court. It has been admitted
by the High Court which has stayed proceedings also in
this case.
It is, therefore. prayed that the proceedings in this
case may be stayed."
A document purporting to be an affidavit was also auached, in
which it was stated :
"I make oath and say that in the above case I have
filed a writ petition in the High Court, that it has been
admitted, and that proceedings in the case have been
stayed by the High Court."
We looked at this so-called affidavit and found that it has
not been sworn to before any person authorised to administer
oaths.
On May 2 I, 1964, Mahabir filed an application under ss.
4 and 5 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1952, against the five
appellants and S. K. Srivastava, A.S.D.M. The main allegation.
apart from reciting the facts which we have already detailed
above, was that "in spite of the knowledge of tnc interim stay
dated 20-12-63 passed by the Hon'ble High Court the Sarpanch,
the Opposite Party No. I and the members of the Bench, Opposite Parties Nos. 2 to 5 disobeyed the order of the Hon'ble High
Court and disposed of the case on 25-12-63 and thus they committed contempt of the Hon'ble High Court."
Affidavits were
filed in the High Court by Baldco Prasad, pairokar of Mahabir.
Bunna Prasad, the Sarpanch, and Mahabir, and statements of
Phagu Prasad and Bunna Prasad were recorded on oath. Bunna
Prasad, in his affidavit, stated that as the Nyaya Panchayat was
not satisfied for want of evidence by way of proper affidavit etc.,
the Nyaya J>anchayats proceeded with the case.
Phagu Prasad ..
in his statement, stated :
"As the paper of Mahabir's application and affidavit
was not good, we had asked him to get them written
on a proper paper obtained from the Tehsil. We had
also told him to get the affidavit verified beforn some
Tchsil authority. We had told Mahabir as above before
we had read the application and affidavit presented before the Nyaya Panchayat.
Mahabir told us that he
is not prepared to go to Tehsil, but is presenting before
the Panchayat whatever he has got in his possession."
Phagu Prasad further stated that "no other affidavit had ever
been filed before us, "but we knew that in the law courts the
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BUNNA PRASAD v. STATE OF U.P. (Sikri, J.)
119
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affidavits, which are filed, are verllied by some authority." He
further added that "the reason why we did not believe the affidavit of Mahabir was that it dia not contain any date of the High
Court's stay order."
Bunna Prasad, in his statement, stated
that he had told Mahabir to bring the affidavit on a good quality
paper of full size, and Mahabir thereupon told him that he
B
would present whatever he had. According to him, the Panchas
did not tell Mahabir that his affidavit was not proper; they, however, told him to get it verified in Tehsil and that it should be
duly sealed ..
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The High Court, on examination of the evidence, came to
the conclusion that it was the Sarpanch who had initially declared
that the affidavit 0£ the applicant was not proper and that the
latter should file a proper affidavit in support of his allegations,
though the Sarpanch had admitted in his deposition that he had
no authority to tell Mahabir that his afiid[!vit was not proper. It
appeared to the High Court that "the Sarpanch first wanted to
ayoid the petitioner's affidavit being brought on the record by
declaring that it was not proper because it did not fully evidence
the fact that the High Court had passed an order staying proceedings before the Nyaya Panchayat." The High Court further held
that "the Nyaya Panchas faithfully accepted the objections raised
by the Sarpanch and dittoed him about the impropriety of the
petitioner's affidavit and inadequacy of the evidence contained
therein regarding the stay order alleged to have been passed by
the High Court." The High Court disbelieved the explanation
of the Panchas given before it because no mention of these was
made in the order sheet dated December 25, 1963. The High
Court held:
.
"There was no reasonable ground for the Panchas to
have doubted the averments made in the application and
affidavit of Mahabir that the High Court bad stayed furtb~r p~oceedings before the Panchayat, nor is there any
thing m the order sheet to show that the Panchas did
not believe the contents of the application and affidavit
of Mahabir. However, if they wanted to ascertain the
matter, they should have at best stayed the proceedings
for a short while and should have asked the applicant
to rro.<1uce a certified copy of the stay order. In the alternative, they should have verified from the Sub Divisional Magistrate whether Mahabir had really filed an
application and affidavit before him along with the original telegram received from his counsel at Allahabad
saying that the High Court had already stayed the proceedings before· the Nyaya Panchayat. But the Panchas
did nothing of the kind. The action of the Nyaya Panchas in not doing so was obviously- ndt bona fide and
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120
SUPREME COURT REPORTS
[1969) I S.C.R.
amounts to wilful disobedience of the High Court's
order."
The learned counsel for the appellants, Mr. Chari, says that
no contempt of court ha' been established because a Court is
entitled not to act on an application which is not accompanied
by an affidavit properly sworn to or a certified copy of the order.
He urges that the Nyaya Panchayats exercised judicial powers
;md, even if the Panchas erred in not staying proceedings, before
finding them guilty of contempt of court it sbould be definitely
proved that the order was passed deliberately to by-pass the order
of the High Court.
This Court quoted with approval the following passage from
Oswald's Contempt of Court, in Hoshiar Singh v.
G11rbacha11
Singh('):
"The judgment or order should be served on the
!larty personally, except in the following cases: (I) prohibitive orders, the drawing up of which is not completed; ..... .
In order to justify committal for breach of a prohibitive order it is not necessary that the order should have
been served upon the party against whom it has been
granted, if it be proved that he had notice of the order
aliunde, as by telegram, or newspaper report, or otherwise, and knew that it was intended to be enforced, or
if he consented to the order, or if he was present in
Court when the order _was pronounced, or when the
motion was made, although he left before the order was
pronounced."
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We need not consider whether it makes any diffemce in law if
the order has been drawn up.
We will for the purpose of this
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case assume that it docs not make any difference.
It is also
clear that in such matters those who assert that a person had
knowledge of the order must prove this fact beyond all reasor.-
able .doubt. If there is any doubt, the benefit ought to· be givoo
to the person charged with contempt of ·court. If a person bono
fide comes to the conclusion on the material placed before him
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that the source of infornrntion is not authentic he cannot be held
guilty of contempt of court for disobeying the order.
The question then arises whether the Sarpanch and the Panchas had knowledge of the existence of the order o[ the High
Court dated December 20, 1963. The only material before them
was the application dated December 25, 1963, which was not
H
supported by any affidavit sworn to before a person authorised to
Or (19621 Supp. l S.C:R. 127, 138 .
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BUNNA PRASAD V. STATE OF U.P. (Sikri, J.)
121
administer oaths.
Further, the application did not contain the
date of the order; even a copy of the telegram was not attached
to the application; and the application seems to have been made
after the proceedings on that date had commenced and evidence
taken.
We are unable to appreciate how on this material the bona
{fries of the Panchas can be doubted if they refused to accept the
mere statement of the party that the High C~mrt had stayed proceedings before them. It seems to us that the High Court did not
appreciate that the so-called affidavit which was filed before the
Panchas was in fact not an affidavit at all. It had not been sworn
to before any person authorised to administer oaths. It was no
part of the duty of the Panchas to enquire from the S.D.M.
about the filing of the application before him.
At any rate, he
has apparently no jurisdiction to
stay proceedings before the
Nyaya Panchayats when no proceeding is pending before him. It
is true that in certain cases proceedings can be adjourned to enable the parties to file better proof, but a judicial officer is not
bound to do so and, if he bona fide does not in his discretion
adjourn proceedings, it cannot be said that he has committed
contempt of court. It must_ also be borne in mind that Panchas
are not well-versed in law and procedure and the records maintained by them should not be judged in the same manner as that
of ordinary courts.
With respect, the High Court should not
have drawn an adverse jnference fron1 the fact that the reasons
for not accepting the prayer for stay were not recorded.
Contempt of court is a serious matter and a High Court should be
chary of finding a judicial officer guility of contempt of court
for disobeying its orders unless there. is unimpeachable evidence
that the judicial officer had k~owledge of the order of the High
Court. Jn our opinion, there is no such evidence in this case .
.The learned counsel for the State contends that we should
not re.appreciate the facts, but, with respects, it seems to
us
that the High Court, while dealing with the evidence, has not kept
in mind the principles which we have mentioned above.
In the result we allow the appeal and set aside the judgment
and order of the High Court.
R.K.P.S.
Appeal al!ow~d.
10Sup. C. 1.-~ 68 - 9
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