Supreme Court tells govt lawyers to avoid relying on oral instructions for arguments

The Supreme Court recently stressed on the need to ensure that lawyers, particularly government counsel, rely on written instructions by the parties to a case (litigants) while making their arguments [KC Kaushik and Others v. State of Haryana and Others].

A Bench of Justices Pankaj Mithal and R Mahadevan explained that placing reliance on oral instructions may lead to errors and affect the fair adjudication of cases.

The Bench added that court orders should be based only on arguments rooted in written instructions, so that litigants are held responsible if any wrong instruction is given.

Therefore, lawyers representing government authorities must ensure that they are equipped with proper written instructions from competent authorities before making any submission before the Court, the Bench said.

"The Court should also pass orders only based on the written instructions, so as to enable it to fix the liability on the correct official(s), responsible for any such wrongful representations / instructions. Therefore, it is imperative that the official(s)/counsel(s) appearing before the Court to represent the Government authorities should equip with proper written instructions from the competent authority(ies)," the October 21 ruling said.

It added that courts should act sternly if any party is found to have given misleading information.

"Needless to state that if any misrepresentation is made on the part of the parties, in particular, Government authorities, the court should not shy away from it, rather act sternly by mulcting with costs on the official(s) who make the same," the Court cautioned.

The Bench observed that litigants must provide truthful and accurate information to the court to facilitate fair adjudication. To ensure this, lawyers should avoid relying on oral instructions from their clients, the Court explained.

"We wish to observe that each party should present truthful and accurate information to the court to facilitate fair adjudication. Such information should be provided in the form of writing. Relying on the oral instructions may lead to factual errors, misunderstanding / misrepresentations, etc., ultimately compromising the integrity of the judicial process. Misleading representations not only affect the parties involved, but also erode public trust in the judicial system as a whole," the Court said.

The Court made these observations while dealing with an appeal by certain lecturers/Principals who had worked in government-aided private colleges who sought parity to other lecturers/ librarians in government colleges when it came to pension payments.

The appellants claimed that they were entitled to interest for the delay in making some revised pension payments.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court had earlier declined to order any relief to the appellants after the Haryana government submitted that it will be providing interest on delayed payments of revised pension.

When the matter reached the Supreme Court, the top court observed that the said State submission was based on an oral instruction, and that there was no written instruction on this issue. The top court viewed this as a lapse on the part of the State.

Nevertheless, the Court, after examining the case on merits, found that the appellants were not entitled to any interest payments. The Court added that the State's lapse cannot lead the unjust enrichment of the appellants and dismissed the appeal.

[Read Judgment]