Professional Misconduct – Clause (7), Part I, Second Schedule, Chartered Accountants Act, 1949 – Gross Negligence – Issuance of Utilization Certificates without adequate verification – Council of ICAI held respondent guilty of professional misconduct for certifying financial statements without corroborating documents and failing to disclose reliance on other sources –...
Service Law – Seniority List – Promotion – Writ petition challenging the revised seniority list dated 14.3.2022, which placed the petitioner at a lower rank and affected his promotion prospects – Petitioner contended that his service should be reckoned from his date of regularization in 1998, not from his initial appointment in 1997, which was on a consolidated pay during t...
Rowdy History Sheet – Personal Liberty – Deletion Ordered – The petitioner sought removal of his name from the rowdy history sheet, arguing harassment and absence of convictions in 20 out of 21 cases – Held: Retaining the petitioner’s name without any conviction amounts to infringement of liberty; inclusion prejudices reputation and liberty, contrary to Article 21 of ...
Partition Suit – Presumption of Jointness – Burden of Proof – A joint Hindu family is presumed to remain joint unless contrary evidence is provided – In cases of alleged prior partition, the burden lies on the party asserting it – Held: The defendants failed to establish that the suit properties were previously partitioned by metes and bounds, and the presumption of j...
Writ Jurisdiction – Judicial Orders of Civil Courts – Scope Under Articles 226 and 227 Distinguished – Petitioners challenged rejection of an amendment application by a civil court under Article 226 – Court clarified that judicial orders of civil courts are not amenable to writ jurisdiction under Article 226 but can be reviewed under Article 227, as reiterated in Radhey Shy...
Caste Claim – Rejection for Lack of Evidence – Validity Upheld – Petitioner’s claim for belonging to "Mana" Scheduled Tribe was rejected due to discrepancies in ancestral records – Vigilance Cell report found tampered documents wherein "Mani" was altered to "Mana" – Court upheld Committee’s rejection, emphasizing the probative...
Jurisdiction of Benches – Appeals Based on Sentence Length – Rules Clarified – Question arose whether criminal appeals with a sentence of ten years or less, traditionally heard by a Single Judge, could be transferred to a Division Bench when arising from a common trial court judgment involving cases requiring Division Bench jurisdiction (e.g., under Section 372 or 377 CrPC) &ndas...
Service Law - Statutory Rule Amendment – Retrospective Application – Prejudice to Vested Rights – The petitioners challenged the application of the OPS Amendment Order, 2021, which introduced additional disqualification criteria for redeployment, to vacancies arising in 2021. The Court held that the amendment could not retroactively impact the accrued rights of the petitioners, w...
Land Revenue – Correction of Khasra Girdawari during Civil Suit – Legal Prohibition – The revenue authorities allowed the correction of khasra girdawari during the pendency of a civil suit involving the same land, despite the existence of a status-quo order. – Held: Once a civil suit is pending, and a status-quo order is in place, it is inappropriate and contrary to law for...
Service Law - Jurisdiction of Summary Security Force Court (SSFC) – Section 46 of BSF Act – Trial of Civil Offences – Nullity of Proceedings – The Summary Security Force Court convicted and punished the petitioners for remitting bank drafts disproportionate to their known sources of income under Section 46 of the BSF Act read with Section 13(e) of the Prevention of Corrupti...