“PIL cannot be a camouflage to foster personal dispute”, Bombay HC imposes costs on petitioner

Frivolous litigants be forewarned. After the Apex Court recently imposed costs on a petitioner for filing a frivolous lawsuit, the Bombay High Court seems to have followed in its footsteps..A Bench comprising Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice GS Kulkarni has imposed exemplary costs on a petitioner they viewed as using a PIL to settle a personal vendetta..Petitioner Manoj Kapadia had sought action against Achyut Hange, commissioner of Mira-Bhayandar Municipal Corporation, for allegedly illegally granting development rights to one builder in 2015, thereby causing a huge loss to the public exchequer..The hearing, however, led to some revelations. Namely, that the rights were granted in compliance with court orders..But more than the merits of the case, it was the suspicious behaviour of the petitioner that invoked the wrath of the Court. Since that the Petitioner had not approached the Court “with clean hands”, and had supressed material facts, including the fact that he was in the very same line of work and might have a vested interest in the matter, the Court stated,.“…it is well settled that a Public Interest Petition cannot be a camouflage to foster personal dispute. Such petitions are to be thrown out. There must be real and genuine public interest involved in the litigation. Public Interest Litigation cannot be invoked by a person to further his personal causes or satisfy his personal grudge and enmity. It is well settled that Courts of justice should not be allowed to be polluted by unscrupulous litigants by resorting to the extraordinary jurisdiction.”.Noting that “imposition of exemplary costs is a necessary instrument which has to be deployed to weed out, as well as to prevent the filing of frivolous cases”, the Bench proceeded to dismiss the Public Interest Litigation with exemplary costs of Rs. 5,00,000/..Advocate Tushar Sonawane appeared for the petitioner, and Advocate MS Lagu for Hange..Read the order below.