SANJAY KUMARversusTHE STATE OF BIHAR & ANR.

                        [2014) 1 S.C.R. 848


A                        SANJAY KUMAR
                                  v
                  THE STATE OF BIHAR & ANR.
          (Special Leave Petition (Crl.) No.9967 of 2011)
                        JANUARY 28, 2014
B
         [DR. B.S. CHAUHAN, J. CHELAMESWAR AND
                      M.Y. EQBAL, JJ.]

        PLEADINGS:
c
        Complaint for offences punishable u/ss 406 and 420 /PC
  and s. 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act - Quashed by High
  Court - SLP by complainant - Notice to petitioner-
  complainant to show that the institution was a fake one as
  pleaded by him - Petitioner seeking to ignore such pleadings
0 - Held: Pleadings have to be true to the knowledge of parties
  and in case a person takes such misleading pleadings, he
  can be refused not only any kind of indulgence by court but
  can also be tried for perjury - In case, pleading taken by
  petitioner is true, he cannot ask for ignoring the same - In
E case, it is false and as such statement had been made on
  oath, he is liable to be tried for perjury - More so, whether
  such a pleading is relevant or not is a matter to be decided
  by court and uls 165 of the Evidence Act, 1872, court has a
  right to ask the party even relevant or irrelevant questions and
F parties or their counsel cannot raise any objection to any sucf1
  question - Conduct of petitioner condemned - Code of
  Criminal Procedure, 1973 - s. 482 - Evidence Act, 1872 -
    s. 165.

G       PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE:
         Advocate-on-Record - Not appearing before Court in
    spite of directions - Held: In Re: Rameshwar Prasad Goyal,
    Court has held that in case AOR does not appear in Court,
                                848
        SANJAY KUMAR v. STATE OF BIHAR                   849


his conduct may tantamount to criminal contempt of Court - A
In the instant case, AOR, with impunity was disdainful towards
the order of the Court directing him to appear in Court - He
had also not filed any appearance for the counsel who had
appeared, nor did the said counsel disclose his name -
Court takes serious note of the conduct of AOR and warns B
him to behave in an appropriate manner befitting the conduct
of an advocate and an AOR, otherwise Court will take action
against him - His conduct will be under close watch of the
Court.
    In Re: Rameshwar Prasad Goyal (2014) 1 SCC 572 -             C
relied on.

                     Case Law Reference:
    (2014) 1 sec 572          relied on            para 5
                                                                 D
     CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Special Leave
Petition (Criminal } No. 9967 of 2011.

    From the Judgment and Order dated 22.07.2011 of the
High Court of Patna in CRLM No. 13116 of 2009.                   E

    Manu Shanker Mishra for the Appellant.

    Gopal Singh, Chandan Kumar for the Respondents.

    The following Order of the Court was delivered               F
                           ORDER

     1. This special leave petition has been filed against the
impugned judgment and order dated 22.7.2011, passed by the
High Court of Judicature at Patna in Criminal Misc. No.13116     G
of 2009 quashing the criminal proceedings against the
respondent no.2 while allowing the application under Section
482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (hereinafter
referred to as 'Cr.P.C.').        ~
                                                                 H
       850         SUPREME COURT REPORTS                 [2014) 1 S.C.R.

-- A           2. Facts and circumstances giving rise to this petition are
       tHat:

         A. The petitioner claimed to have been appointed by the
    private respondent no.2 in a fake dental college as a Senior
    Lecturer for a period of one year and issued 12 post dated
  8
    cheques for payment of his salary out of which 9 cheques had
    bounced. The complainant-petitioner sent legal notice to the
    respondent no.2 but without giving them sufficient time to file a
    reply, filed a complaint before the Magistrate at Danapur, Patna
    under Sections 34, 403, 404, 406, 408, 418, 420 and 504 of
  C the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (hereinafter referred to as 'IPC')
    and under Section 138 of Negotiable Instrument Act, 1881
    (hereinafter referred to as 'NI Acf).

          B. Learned Magistrate, Danapur vide an order dated
  D 12.5.2008 summoned the private respondent for appearance
    on 12.6.2008, being prima facie of the view that a case under
    Sections 406, 420 IPC and under Section 138 of NI Act was
    made out by the petitioner. The private respondent challenged
    the said order by filing the petition before the High Court which
  E has been allowed vide impugned judgment and order on various
    grounds, inter-alia that there was an agreement between the
    parties for service for one year and one of the conditions in the
    agreement was that the petitioner would not resign from the
    institute till the completion of 3 years. More so, the petitioner
  F did not even give sufficient time to the accused to respond to
    the legal notice as he filed the complaint within the close _
    proximity of the date of the notice. The High Court also
    concluded that there was nothing on record to show that the
    notice had ever been served upon the private respondent and
  G ultimately allowed the said petition on the ground that it was a
    case of civil nature as it was a matter of recovery of salary.
            C. Aggrieved, the petitioner approached this Court making
       the averrnent in the petition that accused persons had been
       running a fake institution and offered the appointment to the
  H
        SANJAY KUMAR v. STATE OF BIHAR                        851


petitioner on certain terms and in spite of working therein, he       A
was not paid the salary.

    Hence, this petition.

      3. In the instant case the counsel appearing in the court
for the petitioner designated himself merely as a proxy counsel.      B
The Advocate-on-record (for short 'AOR') had no courtesy to
send, at least, a slip mentioning the name of the counsel who
has to appear in the court. Thus, in such a fact-situation, we
had no advantage even to know the name of the counsel who
was appearing in the court.                                           C

      4. Earlier, this Court had issued notice to the petitioner
himself to show cause that in case it was a fake institution, what
was the reason or rationale for the petitioner to join the same
and to continue to serve there for one year. In reply to the said
                                                                      0
show cause notice, the petitioner submitted that such pleadings
be ignored and may not be taken into account for the purpose
of disposal of the instant petition. We do not see any reason
to allow a party to make a pleading in the petition and then
make a submission to the court to ignore it as such an issue
has no bearing on the merits of the case being totally irrelevant.    E
Pleadings have to be true to the knowledge of the parties and
in case a person takes such misleading pleadings, he can be
refused not only any kind of indulgence by the court but can also
be tried for perjury. In case, the pleading taken by the petitioner
is true, he cannot ask for ignoring the same. In case, it is false    F
and as such statement had been made on oath, he is liable to
be tried for perjury. More so, whether such a pleading is relevant
or not is a matter to be decided by the court and under Section
165 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, court has a right to ask
the party even relevant or irrelevant questions and the parties       G
or their counsel cannot raise any objection to any such question.

     5. In such a fact-situation, words fail us to condemn the
audacity of the petitioner to tell the highest court of the land to
ignore the pleadings taken by him.                                    H
    852        SUPREME COURT REPORTS                 [2014] 1 S.C.R.


A       Be that as it may, this Court had insisted at the time of first
  round of hearing of this case that AOR, Shri Manu Shanker
  Mishra should remain present in the Court at the time of
  arguments and also passed over the matter for his appearance.
  In the second round, it was informed to us that the AOR refused
8 to  come to the court. We take a very serious note of the
  conduct of this AOR, particularly, in view of the judgment of this
  Court In Re: Rameshwar Prasad Goyal, (2014) 1 SCC 572,
  wherein this Court has categorically held that in case the AOR
  does not appear in the court, his conduct may tantamount to
C criminal contempt of the court. In fact, a very few AsOR have
  spoiled the working system of the institution of AsOR who
  simply lend their signatures for petty amount. The AOR involved
  herein is living in a fool's paradise if he thinks that he can play
  hide and seek with any court of law.·

D      In such a chaotic situation, any "Arzi", "Farzi", half-baked
  lawyer under the label of "proxy counsel", a phrase not
  traceable under the Advocates Act, 1961 or under the Supreme
  Court Rules, 1966 etc., cannot be allowed to abuse and misuse
  the process of the court under a false impression that he has
E a right to waste public time without any authority to appear in
  the court, either from the litigant or from the AOR, as in the
  instant case. The AOR, with impunity was disdainful towards
  the order of this Court directing him to appear in the court. He
  had also not filed any appearance for the counsel who had
F appeared, nor the said counsel disclosed his name. The Court
  takes serious note of the conduct of the AOR, Shri Manu
  Shanker Mishra and warns him to behave in an appropriate
  manner befitting the conduct of an advocate and an AOR
  otherwise this Court will not hesitate to take action against him.
G His conduct will be under close watch of this Court.
           6. With the aforesaid observations, the petition stands
    dismissed.

    R.P.                                            SLP dismissed.
H