Delinquency in judicial responsibility: Madhya Pradesh High Court reprimands trial court for issuing a silent judgement
In a significant ruling, the Madhya Pradesh High Court has quashed a non-speaking order passed by a trial court judge, and directed the trial court to decide on all pending applications within 60 days.
The case in question involved applications filed under Order 1 Rule 10 of the Code of Civil Procedure (CPC), which allow for the substitution of parties or the deletion of wrongly added parties in a civil suit. The matter was initially heard by the trial court, but the court dismissed the applications due to the case files being in disarray and the litigant's failure to appear for a hearing on April 21.
Advocate Utkarsh Joshi appeared for the petitioner, while Advocate Mradula Sen represented the respondent. A copy of the High Court's order was sent to the concerned court for necessary compliance.
The High Court's order, issued on September 15, emphasised that the organization of case files is the duty of court staff, and that a litigant's applications cannot be rejected merely due to disorganized files. The High Court further stated that the trial court's order, which recorded multiple applications under various provisions of the CPC and Evidence Act as pending but not taken up due to the disorganised state of the case files, was an abdication of judicial duty.
On September 15, the High Court granted relief to the petitioner by quashing the trial court's earlier dismissal of their applications. The High Court's order also directed the trial court to decide all the pending applications on their own merits after perusing the record and giving opportunity of hearing to the petitioner, within a period of 60 days from the date of receipt of certified copy of this order.
It is important to note that neither the plaintiff nor their counsel was present at the fixed time on April 21. A copy of this order was also sent to the concerned Principal District Judge for information.
The president of the court that issued the decision on September 15 cannot be determined from the provided search results. However, this ruling underscores the importance of proper case management and the need for judges to provide clear and speaking orders in all cases.
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