After 40 adjournments over 3 years, Supreme Court directs Calcutta HC to list La Martiniere matter before new bench

The Supreme Court recently implored the Calcutta High Court to take up for hearing and final disposal a plea seeking vacation of a stay on Kolkata's La Martienere School from being managed by its board of governors. [Rt Rev Paritosh Canning and ors v. Anil Rajkumar Mukerji and ors].A Bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Ahsanuddin Amanullah noted with dismay that six months after it had passed an order asking the High Court to take the matter up, there was no improvement."Six months down the line there is no change of scenario, except for the number of adjournments have been added to the already unending list of adjournments before that...it is difficult to countenance a continued saga of adjournments over the last almost three years now, numbering almost 40", the order dated May 18 states.The top court thus ordered the High Court's Chief Justice to assign the matter to a new bench."We have no other option but to draw a conclusion that for whatever reasons, the Bench constituted to hear this matter is unable to attend it...Needless to say, we would expect the newly assigned Bench to attend to the matter promptly, especially taking into consideration the urgency requirement, the scope of the appeal and the previous saga of adjournments."It noted the contetions that virtual hearings in the matter were being hampered, and observed,"We fail to appreciate that as the counsels will have the option to either appear virtually or physically.".The matter concerned a Calcutta High Court stay order that has been operating for three years. The present appellant had in 2019 initiated removal of the contesting respondents from the school's board of governors, after allegations of irregularities in their appointment had surfaced. The same was challenged, and the respondents got protection in the form of a stay order barring any appointment of new board members to replace them, till the civit suit filed by them was disposed of..In 2019, the High Court appointed an administrator for the school, to whom the board was supposed to report for any decision to be processed. The stay order was vacated in August 2020, only to be brought back by a Division Bench in October that year.The appellants had in an earlier round of litigation before the top court urged that the High Court dispose of the plea seeking vacation of the stay, a request that the top court said must be considered given the facts.However, the case has only seen multiple adjournments since, with the respondents continuing to effectively remain on the board of governors..Advocates Sankalp Narain, Rohit Amit Sthalekar, BP Tiwari and Srivats Narain represented the appellants.Advocates Shatadru Chakraborty, Sonia Dube, Kanchan Yadav, Surbih Anand, Tanishq Sharma, and T Mahipal, briefed by Legal Options, represented the respondents..[Read order]