Dysfunctional air-conditioners, possibly offensive Sr Registrar involved in criminal contempt before Allahabad HC

The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court recently initiated criminal contempt proceedings against one AK Mukherjee, a Senior Registrar at the High Court. And it all started off with a courtroom where five out of the seven installed air-conditioners refused to work..On August 25, an annoyed Bench of Justices Mahendra Dayal and Rajiv Sharma summoned Senior Registrar AK Mukherjee to the court, after it was noticed that the non-working air conditioners had created a “warm and humid” atmosphere in court. Mukherjee was told to look into the matter and ensure that the “judicial functioning” of the court was not affected by this technical glitch..The next day, things became worse. Not only did the air-conditioners remain broken but one of the air-conditioner panels actually broke away and fell on a litigant. Although the litigant sustained no major injuries, the damage had been done. The order passed on August 26 goes to great lengths to explain the importance of air-conditioners within the judicial machinery..“The highest constitutional body on judicial side of the State should be made functional to its optimum level. In other words, Courts should function at all costs but on account of non-functioning of ACs and humidity and warmness in the Court, it becomes very difficult to discharge the judicial functions.”.Summoning Mukherjee once again, the Bench sought an explanation as to why the air conditioners had not been fixed. And it was Mukherjee’s reply that seems to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. As reported in the order, Mukherjee told the Bench in open court that,.“Contempt karna hai to kar de (If you want to initiate contempt proceedings, do so)”.Giving him a few day’s time to reply, the matter was posted on the first of this month for further hearing. On the said date, Mukherjee is understood to have submitted a reply but refused to disclose what exactly the reply stated..The matter may well have gone unnoticed had it not been for Nutan “Tsunami” Thakur, who sent a representation to Chief Justice Lodha asking him to transfer the matter to the Supreme Court. Her representation also provides an explanation of sorts into why Mukherjee may have said what he did..“A reading of the sentence “contempt karna hai to kar de” …. also makes it visibly clear that the Senior Registrar faced such circumstances where he got fed up with the situation he was facing and in the state of visibly irritated mind, he forgot everything and reaching the maximum level of revolt that he could ever think of or imagine…[T]hese words of the Senior Registrar prima-facie seem to show his extreme helplessness and pathos which he had to undergo in the prevailing circumstances where the facts and circumstances seem to suggest that when called to the Court room, the Senior Registrar was clearly humiliated, abused and threatened with dire consequences, including the use of contempt proceeding, where after repeated threats, somewhere in the process, the Senior Registrar’s cool and temper seemed to have snapped and he uttered the words mentioned in the word, which possibly he would not even have dreamed to state in the normal circumstances..In all likelihood, Mukherjee has submitted an unconditional apology, one that will be accepted by the court, putting the matter to an end. One can only hope that the air-conditioners are finally working; after all “humidity and warmness” should not adversely affect the judicial machinery of this country.