Mohd. Shafiq And Others vs Anuradha Gupta, Director School Education, Jammu And Another

Thakur, J

The present Letters Patent Appeal has been preferred against the judgment and order dated 18.02.2020 passed in CPSW No. 737/2018, whereby

the proceedings in contempt petition have been closed.

On a perusal of the judgment and order impugned, it can be seen that the proceedings were closed by the learned Single Judge on the ground that a

detailed order of consideration No.DSEJ/legal/12958-61 dated 30.03.2019 had been passed by the Director School Education, Jammu and that the only

remedy available to the petitioners was to throw a challenge to the said order of consideration.

Learned counsel for the appellants states that the order of closure of the contempt proceedings was erroneous in law, inasmuch as, there was no

option available to the Director School Education, Jammu but to issue the orders of appointment in favour of the petitioners as per the letter and spirit

of the earlier judgement and order dated 07.04.2015 passed in SWP No. 1004/2015. For reference, the judgement and order dated 07.04.2015 passed

in SWP No. 1004/2015, in regard to which the contempt proceedings had been initiated at the behest of the petitioners reads as under:-

Learned counsel for the petitioners stated at the Bar that the petitioners would be satisfied in case the petition in hand is disposed of with a direction

to the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 to consider the case of the petitioners in light of order dated 03.11.2009 passed in APSWP No. 39/2009 in SWP No.

2607/2001.

His statement is taken on record.

At request, the petition in hand is taken up for final disposal and, as such, disposed of with a direction to the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 to consider the

claim of the petitioners in light of order dated 03.11.2009, passed in APSWP No. 39/2009 in SWP No. 2607/2001, referred to herein above, provided

the same is applicable in the case in hand and pass appropriate consideration within a period of six weeks from the date a certified copy of this order

is made available to them.

Learned counsel for the appellants, therefore, vehemently urged that the orders of appointments have to follow as a necessary consequence subject

to of course to verification of the antecedents and fulfillment of other conditions laid down vide judgement and order supra.

At the very outset, we are confronted with the issue of maintainability of the present Letters Patent Appeal. The issue with regard to the

maintainability of the instant LPA in such circumstances is no longer res integra. The Apex Court while dealing with the issue in “Mindapore

Peoples’ Coop. Bank Ltd and others Vs Chunilal Nanda and othersâ€​ reported in (2006) 5 SCC 399 held in para 12 as under:-

“12. ………….. Any direction issued or decision made by the High Court on the merits of a dispute between the parties, will not be in the

exercise of 'jurisdiction to punish for contempt' and therefore, not appealable under section 19 of CC Act. The only exception is where such direction

or decision is incidental to or inextricably connected with the order punishing for contempt, in which event the appeal under section 19 of the Act, can

also encompass the incidental or inextricably connected directions.

If the High Court, for whatsoever reason, decides an issue or makes any direction, relating to the merits of the dispute between the parties, in a

contempt proceedings, the aggrieved person is not without remedy. Such an order is open to challenge in an intra-court appeal (if the order was of a

learned Single Judge and there is a provision for an intra-court appeal), or by seeking special leave to appeal under Article 136 of the Constitution of

India (in other cases).â€​

The Apex Court in “Jhareshwar Prasad Paul and another Vs Tarak Nath Ganguly and others†reported in (2002) 5 SCC 352 in para 11

observed as under:-

“11. ……………… the court exercising contempt jurisdiction is primarily concerned with the question of contumacious conduct of the party,

which alleged to have committed deliberate default in complying with the directions in the judgment or order. If the judgment or order does not contain

any specific direction regarding a matter or if there is any ambiguity in the directions issued therein then it will be better to direct the parties to

approach the court which disposed of the matter for clarification of the order instead of the court exercising contempt jurisdiction taking upon itself the

power to decide the original proceeding in a manner not dealt with by the court passing the judgment or order.â€​

The Apex Court in “Director of Education, Uttranchal and others Vs Ved Parkash Joshi and others†reported in (2005) 6 SCC 98 in para 7

observed as under:-

“7. ………….. While dealing with an application for contempt the Court cannot traverse beyond the order, non-compliance of which is alleged. In

other words, it cannot say what should not have been done or what should have been done. It cannot traverse beyond the order. It cannot test

correctness or otherwise of the order or give additional direction or delete any direction.

The Apex Court in “Union of India and others Vs Subedar Devassy PVâ€, reported in (2006) 1 SCC 613 held that that the Court exercising

contempt jurisdiction cannot take upon itself the power to decide the original proceedings in a manner not dealt with by the Court passing the judgment

or order.

Having gone through the judgment and order impugned, it can safely be said that no additional directions were issued by the learned Single Judge

and had proceeded to simply close the contempt proceedings, giving full liberty to the petitioners/appellants herein to avail their remedy of challenging

the order of consideration before the appropriate forum.

In view of the aforementioned discussion, the present Letters Patent Appeal is held not maintainable and is, accordingly, dismissed along with

connected application.