HC condemns junking of woman’s complaint against judicial officer

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has condemned the spiking of a woman’s complaint against a judicial officer, asserting that justice demanded redress of her grievance rather than simply shelving it. Among other things, this led to her losing faith in the justice delivery system, the court observed.

The observation by the Bench of Justice Sureshwar Thakur and Justice Sudeepti Sharma came in a case where the woman, involved in prolonged litigation, posted derogatory remarks about the judiciary on social media leading to the initiation of contempt proceedings.

The Bench observed her complaint against the then Civil Judge (Junior Division)-cum-Judicial Magistrate in Kurukshetra was junked without a hearing by the District and Sessions Judge as the officer had resigned from her post and joined the Delhi Judicial Services. The Bench found the procedural dismissal troubling and indicative of a deeper issue within the judicial process.

"The complaint made by the respondent-contemnor should not have been filed by the District and Sessions Judge, Kurukshetra, and justice demands that it should have been dealt with and the respondent-contemnor should have been heard," the Bench asserted.

The court added that interaction with the woman-contemnor indicated that this was one of the reasons why she had lost faith in the judicial system and was “apprehending that she would never be heard, if she has any grievance against the judicial officers/police officers". The court also took note of repeated instances of harassment and alleged abuse by police officials. It noted that the medical records presented in court revealed numerous injuries, which, as per the amicus curiae, had compounded her distress. “A perusal of the record as well as written synopsis submitted by the amicus curiae shows that the respondent-contemnor was facing too much of harassment under different circumstances,” the Bench asserted, while referring to the psychological impact of these events.

The court described the respondent-contemnor's social media comments as "not acceptable", but saw them as an outburst driven by her "frustration" over the treatment she had endured and perceived systemic indifference.

Dropping the contempt proceedings against her, the Bench asserted that it felt she was “frustrated” owing to the circumstances and events faced during the course of litigation, following which she posted the remarks on social media.

“Though the posting on said remarks on social media is not acceptable to this court, given the above and also after interaction with her, we find that her behaviour was the outcome of the happenings of an unfortunate and unforeseen incident with her. She is facing contempt proceedings since 2018 and we feel that no useful purpose would be served by punishing her. Further, today’s system demands that value oriented, besides a truth-discerning approach, be adopted for thereby putting the dispute to a quietus, since prima facie truth is loaded in the outburst made by the respondent-contemnor on social media”.