Shocked over the findings in Allahabad High Court order Supreme Court directs Chief Justice to withdraw criminal determination from the concerned Judge and make him sit with a Senior Seasoned Judge
Case Details:
Case Name: M/s Shikhar Chemicals vs The State of Uttar Pradesh and another
Case No.: SLP (Criminal) No. 11445 of 2025
Bench: Hon’ble J.B Pardiwala, J., Hon’ble R. Mahadevan, J.
The Supreme Court was shocked at the ignorance of law while passing absurd and erroneous order which is found to be unpardonable. The Court reprimanded the
The Court observed that-“The most disturbing part of this matter is the manner in which the High Court dealt with the quashing application filed by the petitioner-herein and the observations made in para 12 of its impugned order.”
The Court further quoted the High Court order as
“We quote the paragraph 12 as under:-
“12. O.P. no.2 appears to be a very small business firm and for him, the aforesaid amount
along with interest is a huge amount. In case, subject to filing civil suit, O.P. no.2 will not
be in position to pursue the civil litigation. In case, O.P. no.2 files a civil suit firstly, it
will take years for it to see any ray of hope and secondly, he will have to put more money to pursue the litigation. To be more precise it would seem like good money chasing bad money. If this Court allows the matter to be referred to civil court on account of civil dispute between the parties, it would amount to travesty of justice and O.P. no.2 would suffer irreparable loss and he might even not be in a position to emerge from the financial constraints to pursue the matter.”
(Emphasis supplied)
The Court rebuked the High Court by observing that – “The Judge has gone to the extent of saying that asking the complainant to pursue civil remedy for the purpose of recovery of the balance amount will be very unreasonable as civil suit may take a long time before it is decided and, therefore, the complainant should be permitted to institute criminal proceedings for the purpose of recovery of the balance amount. “
The Court further remanded back the matter to the High Court for fresh consideration in the said matter on merits.
The Apex Court came down heavily on the concerned Judge stating-
“23. We request the Hon’ble the Chief Justice of the High Court of Allahabad to assign this matter to any other Judge of the High Court as he may deem fit.
24. The Chief Justice of High Court shall immediately withdraw the present criminal determination from the concerned Judge.
25. The Chief Justice shall make the concerned judge sit in a Division Bench with a seasoned senior judge of the High Court.
26. We further direct that the concerned judge shall not be assigned any criminal determination, till he demits office. If at all at some point of time, he is to be made to sit as a single judge, he shall not be assigned any criminal determination.”