The Week That Was: The Bombay High Court

This week marked the retirement of Justice DH Waghela as Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court. He retired on August 10 and on the very same day law ministry’s appointment of Chief Justice Manjual Chellur of the Calcutta High Court as the new Chief came in..The new chief will assume office from August 24, until then VK Tahilramani J will function as the Acting Chief Justice. Apart from this, the new sitting list which will go in effect from August 16, was uploaded with no major changes..Let us have a look at all that happened this week in various cases going on in the Bombay High Court..Monday, August 8.Mohenjo Daro release cleared, no relief to plaintiff.A division bench of Justices AS Oka and AA Sayed heard an appeal against the order of Justice GS Patel in a suit seeking injunction against the release of the film Mohenjo Daro alleging copyright infringement by Film Director Ashutosh Gowariker. Patel J had imposed a cost of 1.5 lakh on the plaintiff..Observing that the city civil court order had not granted liberty to file a fresh suit in the High Court, Oka J said that there was no reason given in the plaint as to why there was a delay of three months in filing the suit..“The official trailer of the film was released on June 28 2016 and the present suit was filed 8 days after that.”.Ad-interim relief seeking stay on the release of the film was rejected and the appeal has been kept pending. The movie is slated to release on August 12. The matter was adjourned for 6 weeks..Tuesday, August 9.200 crore for wrongful conviction in rape case.Gopal Shetye was acquitted by AM Thipsay J last year in June; the High Court overturned an order of conviction for rape. Shetye’s release came three months after serving his seven-year sentence..Shetye had filed a PIL seeking 200 crores from the state government for”wrongful conviction”. State government informed the division bench of Naresh Patil and PD Naik JJ that a special leave petition against the acquittal will be filed in the Supreme Court..Wednesday, August 10.Bombay HC pulls up DGCA and AAI .The division bench of VM Kanade J and MS Sonak J pulled up Airports Authority of India and DGCA for inaction over illegal structures near the Mumbai Airport..They were hearing a PIL that raises the issue concerning safety of air space around the airport. It is his contention that there is an encroachment on air space by number of builders, as a result, height restrictions have not been followed, and there are several buildings which have come up around the airport, which are above the restricted limit..Mumbai International Airport Ltd. claimed to have issued over 60 notices to developers marking the DGCA but no action was taken..Show cause notices have now been issued to AAI Chairman and Director General of Civil Aviation. Rajiv Chavan appeared for the DGCA as well as Union of India..The bench also vacated a stay order by a single bench on the demolition of a few floors of a building near the airport and ordered the BMC to demolish the illegal floors and initiate criminal proceedings against the developer..Second Woman Chief Justice for the Bombay High Court.Manjula Chellur J. was appointed as the forty-first Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court. She is the second woman to be appointed to the post, the first one being Sujata Manohar J. She will be retiring in December next year..Friday, August 12.Detailed order on Noise Pollution Rules .The division bench of Justices AS Oka and AA Sayed dictated a detailed order on implementation of Noise pollution Rules in the city over the course of the week. Dictation of the order will continue on Tuesday..A total of 1,843 noise decibel meters were to be procured to be used across the state. After Public Prosecutor Sandeep Shinde submitted that these meters will be made available in 60 days, Oka J questioned the delay..The bench recorded in its order that Noise Pollution Rules must be advertized by the state government. Also on the PIL regarding loudspeakers installed in pandals, as well as loudspeakers used during azaan by mosques the bench observed that no religion promotes breaking the law..Oka J said that under Article 25, such practices will have to be an “integral part” of the particular religion for not taking any action against such violations..On the issue of noise mapping, the bench stated.“To use noise mapping for strategic planning in development of the city we issue directions to all planning authorities to identify measures for implementation of rules on the basis of a noise map prepared after such a survey is conducted. These measures can be applied while fixing infrastructure projects all over the city.”.The suggestion for noise mapping was made in one of the petitions in which Senior counsel Darius Khambata was appearing.