The Gauhati High Court has dismissed a PIL with an exemplary cost of Rs one lakh to the petitioner, observing that the PIL was a blatant abuse of the process of law, as it did not serve any public purpose, and purely advanced the commercial and business interests of the petitioner.
The Division Bench of Chief Justice Sudhanshu Dhuliya and Justice Manash Ranjan Pathak, after hearing the arguments from the Additional Advocate General (AAG), Arunachal Pradesh on September 3, observed “A genuine and bonafide PIL must be encouraged by all Courts, but at the same time, a frivolous PIL, which is being filed for extraneous reasons, must be discouraged.”
The PIL was filed by one Debia Tara, seeking direction to the Respondent Authorities to issue Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) afresh for construction of Yazali-Mengio Road to Sito via Tepi village by crossing Polyu River, as per the Technical Sanction of the Government, for greater interest of general public.
The petitioner further sought direction to the Superintending Engineer, Public Work Department (PWD) Yachuli Civil Circle, Lower Subansiri District (Respondent No. 5), to immediately stop the ongoing road construction activities from Yazali-Mengio Road to Sito via Tepi village and not release the bills for execution of the said works in violation and deviation of DPR of the approved technical sanction of the government, to the private construction company.
He also prayed for direction to the state government to appoint an Independent Enquiry Officer by the Central Government Agencies to investigate and enquire about the execution of present works and submit the report directly to the High Court.
The fact of the matter, however, is that the petitioner before the High Court was one of the bidders, who had responded to the Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) issued by the respondent authorities for construction of a road in the state of Arunachal Pradesh.
The AAG, Arunachal Pradesh, informed the High Court that since the petitioner could not get the contract, he filed as many as three petitions before the High Court, which were dismissed. Thereafter, the petitioner preferred an Appeal, which was also eventually dismissed. Having failed in the writ proceedings and the writ appeal, the petitioner has now approached the High Court by filing the present PIL, the AAG added.
The High Court referred to the law as laid down by the apex court in its seminal judgment in the case of State of Uttaranchal vs Balwant Singh Chaufal & Ors reported in 2010, wherein it gave certain guidelines, which are as follows:-
“(1) The Courts must encourage genuine and bona fide PIL and effectively discourage and curb the PIL filed for extraneous considerations.
(2) Instead of every individual Judge devising his own procedure for dealing with the public interest litigation, it would be appropriate for each High Court to properly formulate rules for encouraging the genuine PIL and discouraging the PIL filed with oblique motives.
“Consequently, we request that the High Courts who have not yet framed the rules, should frame the rules within three months. The Registrar General of each High Court is directed to ensure that a copy of the rules prepared by the High Court is sent to the Secretary General of this Court immediately thereafter.
(3) The Courts should prima facie verify the credentials of the petitioner before entertaining a PIL.
(4) The Courts should be prima facie satisfied regarding the correctness of the contents of the petition before entertaining a PIL.
(5) The Courts should be fully satisfied that substantial public interest is involved before entertaining the petition.
(6) The Courts should ensure that the petition, which involves larger public interest, gravity and urgency, must be given priority over other petitions.
(7) The Courts before entertaining the PIL should ensure that the PIL is aimed at redressal of genuine public harm or public injury. The Court should also ensure that there is no personal gain, private motive or oblique motive behind filing the public interest litigation.
(8) The Courts should also ensure that the petitions filed by busybodies for extraneous and ulterior motives must be discouraged by imposing exemplary costs or by adopting similar novel methods to curb frivolous petitions and the petitions filed for extraneous considerations,” noted the Court.
“In view of the above, we are of the opinion that this writ petition has to be dismissed with an exemplary cost. Accordingly, we hereby direct that the petitioner shall deposit Rs one lakh as cost before the Registry of Itanagar Bench of this Court, within a period of two weeks from today. In case the Cost is not deposited, the Registry of Itanagar Bench will bring this fact to the notice of this Court immediately,” the order read.