Supreme Court slaps litigant with ₹1 lakh costs for filing appeal against order deferring service case

The Supreme Court on Monday imposed ₹1 lakh costs on a litigant for filing an appeal challenging a High Court order deferring his service matter till April 8 after issuing notice in the case [Ranbir Singh vs State of Uttar Pradesh and anr]..A bench of Justices BR Gavai, Rajesh Bindal and Sandeep Mehta stated that a message need to be sent to lawyers practicing before the top court that such appeals should not be filed.The bench stressed that counsel, including the advocate on record as well as Senior Counsel Meenakshi Arora should have advised their client better."You have more responsibility to advise your client ... We want a message to be sent to AoRs. Article 136 being filed against notice?" Justice Gavai remarked addressing Arora..AoRs will be reduced to signing authority if allowed to simply sign-off on petitions without accountability: Supreme Court .The petitioner had approached the Supreme Court after the Allahabad High Court had issued notice on plea seeking promotion, but posted the case for hearing next on April 8. .When the senior counsel pointed out today that the apex court itself had earlier asked for the matter to be taken up expeditiously, the bench replied that April 8 is not a long way off. The Court made it clear that such petitions are a waste of time and an abuse of the process of law."We have come across several such Special Leave Petitions (SLPs) filed merely against orders issuing notice, granting adjournment or refusing interim protection. In reference to our earlier order, AoRs are not postmen but also officers of the court and should not merely sign off. They owe a greater responsibility. Such petitions are nothing but an abuse of the process of law and waste the precious time of the court and add to pendency," the bench noted in its order..The order was directed to be circulated to the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and the Supreme Court Advocates on Record Association (SCAORA) so that other lawyers are also made aware of the order.The costs to be paid were directed to be divided equally among the welfare funds of the two bodies.Note: An initial version of the story said that the case was a bail matter. The error is regretted.