Pinnacle Court objects to frivolous PIL petitions, ‘luxury litigation’ eating up court time

04-06-2022

A Vacation Bench asked a litigant to pay ₹18 lakh but later slashed the number to ₹2 lakh on the request of the counsel.

A Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petitioner within the Supreme Court on Friday barely escaped having to pay ₹18 lakh for indulging in an exceedingly “luxury litigation”.

A Vacation Bench of Justices B.R. Gavai and Hima Kohli initially asked the litigant to pay ₹18 lakh, that is, ₹1 lakh for each one amongst the 18 minutes the case took up. However, the court later, in its order, slashed the quantity to ₹2 lakh on the request of the litigant’s counsel.

This case came up shortly after the identical Bench had pronounced a judgment underlining how flippant PIL petitions both encroach into valuable judicial time and stall development work undertaken by the govt. The judgment came in a very challenge to redevelopment work undertaken by the Odisha government round the Puri Jagannath temple.

Justice Gavai, speaking for the Bench, observed that “the highly derogatory practice of filing frivolous petitions encroach on valuable judicial time which might somewhat be utilised for addressing genuine concerns”.

However, in a very February 2022 judgment in Esteem Properties Pvt. Ltd. vs Chetan Kamble, a three-judge Bench led by justice of India N.V. Ramana takes a balanced view of the nice and therefore the bad within the PIL petitions.

In that judgment, the highest court had acknowledged that “thousands of frivolous petitions are filed, burdening the docket of both the Supreme Court and also the High Courts”.

‘Beneficial effect’

But PIL petitions have also had a “beneficial effect on the Indian jurisprudence and has alleviated the conditions of the citizens in general”, the judgment had noted.

The court in Jaipur Shahar Hindu Vikas Samiti v. State of Rajasthan had emphasised how such petitions “bring justice to those who are handicapped by ignorance, indigence, illiteracy”

The Supreme Court had also issued eight directions in its Balwant Singh Chaufal judgment to assist constitutional courts separate genuine PIL petitions from the barmy ones.

It had asked every tribunal to border its own rules to encourage authentic PIL petitions and curb motivated ones.

Some of these directions included verifying the credentials of the petitioner before entertaining the plea; checking the correctness of the contents; ensuring the petition involves problems with “larger public interest, gravity and urgency” which needs priority; ensuring there's no personal gain, private motive or oblique motive behind the PIL petition; ensuring that it's aimed toward redressal of genuine public harm or public injury.

The Supreme Court had directed that PIL petitions filed by “busybodies for extraneous and ulterior motives must be discouraged by imposing exemplary costs”.