“Impose pre-deposit on corporates, costs on frivilous litigants”, AG Rohatgi tells Supreme Court

The Supreme Court today reserved its order on whether the petition seeking establishment of National Court of Appeal should be referred to a Constitution Bench or not..A Bench of Chief Justice TS Thakur and Justices R Banumathi and UU Lalit heard Amicus Curiae KK Venugopal and Salman Khurshid and Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi before reserving its order..The hearing went on for nearly two hours today..KK Venugopal – Hear the case.Amicus Curiae KK Venugopal submitted today that there should be National Court of Appeal to decide Special Leave Petitions from High Courts..“Your lordships are hearing bail applications, matrimonial matters etc. This was not the purpose for which this court was created. Law Commission has repeatedly recommended that. Justice Mathews in 1970s said that he envisaged Supreme Court having 100 judges.”.Justice Thakur told Venugopal that considering the state of things, the filings might increase to 5 lakhs a year and what would be the way out in such a scenario?.“Number of filings might go up to 5 lakhs. If 30 judges deal with 80,000 cases, then in the next 20 years we might need 100 judges. The other argument is why is the Supreme Court entertaining so many cases. Let the error made by lower courts remain uncorrected. But the truth is it is very difficult for us to refrain from correcting errors. Because of our long time at the Bench, we always have the tendency to correct error.”.KK Venugopal said that many times, there is a total lack of application of mind by lower courts..“Those errors have to be corrected and the cases have to be heard by judges of the quality of Supreme Court judges”, he said supporting establishment of National Court of Appeal..Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi – Impose costs on frivolous litigants.Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi began his submissions by saying that when the Supreme Court was established, 5 out of the 7 judges used to sit in Constitution Bench..“Only 2 judges used to hear all and sundry matters. Now it has become a court of appeal which it was not meant to be.”.He said that even if the National Court of Appeal is constituted there is a good chance that people might take their case to Supreme Court saying there are constitutional issues involved..“Even if National Court of Appeal is created, people will attempt to come to Supreme Court saying there is a Constitutional question in my case. It is a self-defeating exercise. It is not that people of USA don’t want to take their cases to Federal Court. The Federal court there has clearly set a benchmark that it will only entertain Constitutional cases of federal character.”.Rohatgi then submitted that a large number of corporate matters come to Supreme Court and they are heard for days together. He said that the said practice has to be strictly discouraged and cited the recent judgment of the Court delivered by a Bench presided by Justice Jasti Chelameswar in which the Court had imposed costs totalling 75 laks on 3 litigants..“Are you suggesting that we mandate a pre-deposit”, asked Justice Thakur..“Why not?”, replied Rohatgi..“Self-correction, use of technology and heavy costs on litigants who come to this court for mundane issues [are some remedies]”, he added..The Attorney General also found support from Fali Nariman who said that he was involved in that case and it was correct on the part of the court to impose the costs..Justice Thakur then pointed out that the Parliament is also responsible for such litigation since it has provided statutory appeals to Supreme Court..“Electricity, Competition, Telecom….you have provided these appeals to Supreme Court”, said Justice Thakur..AG replied that the reason was because the High Courts were getting clogged. He said that the issue requires debate but the Supreme Court is not the forum for the same..“You suggest the forum”, said Justice Thakur..Law commission”, replied the AG..Order reserved.Amicus Curiae Salman Khurshid batted for better use of technology by the Supreme Court including video conferencing for admission matters..Later Senior Advocate TR Andhyarujina also put forth his views. He agreed with KK Venugopal and suggested that the case should be heard by a Constitution Bench of Supreme Court..The Bench reserved its order on whether the case should be referred to a Constitution Bench or not.