Bombay HC Directs Advocate To Gift A Book On Constitution To His Junior Who Was Blamed On Affidavit For Dismissal Of Case Due To Non-Appearance

In an unusual move, the Bombay High Court while dealing with an interim application seeking restoration of an appeal, earlier dismissed for non-appearance, reprimanded an Advocate who attempted to shift the blame for the non-appearance onto a junior Advocate and instead of granting costs in the conventional sense, directed the Advocate to gift a copy of ‘The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation by Granville Austin’ to the junior Advocate.

The Division Bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Arif S. Doctor in its order observed "We find it most unfortunate that the Appellant’s Advocate on record has sought to lay the blame for nonappearance at the hands of a junior Advocate, who had in fact enrolled as an Advocate less than two months before the date on which the said Appeal came to be dismissed. What is worse still is that the said junior Advocate has been made to file an Affidavit stating that the inadvertence was at her end."

Background: A commercial appeal was dismissed on December 15, 2022, for non-appearance on behalf of the Appellant. The Appellant now filed the current application seeking reinstatement and argued that the junior Advocate responsible for tasks such as monitoring the board failed to inform the Appellant's Advocate that the case had been scheduled on the weekly board from December 15, 2022, to December 16, 2022.

The High Court expressed its displeasure with this course adopted and the Counsel appearing on behalf of the Applicant immediately tendered an apology to the Court and submitted that he would immediately expunge the name of the junior Advocate from the record. It was also submitted that the Applicant had always prosecuted the said Appeal diligently and therefore ought to be granted one more chance to prosecute the said Appeal. 

The Court in its order observed that the interest of justice would be served if the  Appeal is therefore restored to file and the Appellant is granted one chance to prosecute the same but, however, directed that "It would be apposite that instead of granting costs in the conventional sense, that the learned Advocate on record for the Appellant gift a copy of ‘The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation by Granville Austin’ to the learned junior Advocate, whose name finds mentioned in Paragraphs 6 and 7 of the Interim Application."

The Court further stated that this would serve as a gesture of goodwill and erase any misunderstanding or ill will that may have occurred in the mind of the junior Advocate, whose name is mentioned in Paragraphs 6 and 7 of the Interim Application. Accordingly, with these observations, the Interim Application was allowed and disposed of.

Cause Title: Memon Co-operative Bank Ltd. v. Rajan Ramchand Gera & Anr. 

Click here to read/download the Order