Court Summoned Records Should Be Shown By Authority To Standing Counsel A Day Before Case Is Listed: Allahabad HC Orders State To Issue Directions For Compliance
The Allahabad High Court has ordered the Legal Remembrancer to issue directions to ensure that records summoned by the Court are shown to the Standing Counsel a day prior to the date on which the matter is listed.
The Court stated that even after passing “several orders in several writ petitions” to relay that officers should take the court-summoned records to the assigned Standing Counsel a day before the date on which the matter has been fixed in Court because “only then the Standing Counsel would be in a position to go through the record and assist the Court on the next date.”
A Division Bench of Justice Rajan Roy and Justice Om Prakash Shukla observed, “We thus make it clear once again that when the records are summoned by the Court, the relevant records should be shown to the Standing Counsel a day prior to the date on which the case is listed so that the Standing Counsel may go through the records and then assist the Court on the next date, as, it is quite possible that after going through the records, the Standing Counsel may himself have some queries to make to the Officer who has brought the records so as to clarify the factual position.”
Advocate Prem Shankar and Mahendra Kumar Dwivedi appeared for the appellant.
The Bench noted that the lapse was not on the part of the Standing Counsel but on the part of the Officers who didn't give clear instructions as to when the records were to be taken.
“We find that very often, this is not done and the Officer's or employees who have been assigned the duty of producing the records, produce it in the Court itself straight away without any opportunity / occasion for the Standing Counsel to go through the records, on account of which proper assistance cannot be provided,” the Court remarked.
Consequently, the Court directed, “the Legal Remembrancer, State of U.P. to take cognizance of this aspect and issue necessary directions/orders to all concerned departments to comply with what has been stated hereinabove.”
The issue arose after an appeal was filed against the order which gave an Inquiry Officer one more opportunity to submit his evidence. The Court noted, “We fail to understand as to how it has been observed that one more opportunity is being given.”
During the appeal, it was revealed that the charge sheet against the appellant had been served, and a reply along with evidence was submitted. However, the Inquiry Officer's order dated 06.01.2023, which granted "one more opportunity" for evidence submission, was questioned by the Court. The Court observed that prior to 2023, no time was granted for evidence.
Accordingly, the High Court allowed the appeal.
Cause Title: Sanjay Kumar Singh v. State Of U.P. & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2024:AHC-LKO:56286-DB)