Legal News & Views

The Chandigarh State Commission, while allowing a complaint against Premium Acres Infratech Private limited, ruled that a consumer cannot be made to suffer on account of inter-se disputes between company directors. The complainants, Sundeep Singh and his wife, Jagpuneet Kaur of Fatehgarh Sahib, bought a villa at "The Courtyard Villas," a housing project of TDI City in Sector 110, Mohali, from then directors, Amit Jain and Sanjay Jain. They paid the directors but later, both were removed. The new director who took over refused to give them procession. In his reply, he filed that possession could not be given because the complainants did not make timely payments. Current director of the company, PS Sehgal contended that Sanjay Jain, ex-director issued forged receipts and other documents to the customers, on account of which several criminal and civil cases were pending and therefore the court should not rely on the said documents in favour of the consumers. However, cons...

Abusing in-laws and not allowing them to reside in the matrimonial home by a woman amounts to cruelty to her spouse, ground enough for grant of divorce, the Supreme Court has ruled while allowing an NRI's plea for legal separation from his wife. A bench of Justices Vikaramajit Sen and A M Sapre said such incidents could not be termed as "wear and tear" of family life as held by Madras High Court which had said that a couple must be prepared to face such situations in matrimonial relationship. The NRI had filed a divorce petition alleging that his wife was abusive to his family members and did not allow his parents and siblings to stay in his house when they visited the US. Referring to an incident, the husband told the court that his wife had once locked him and his sister out of the house and abused them saying they belonged to a 'prostitute family'. She refused to allow her sister-in-law to enter the house and even lodged a police complaint against her hu...

Section 8(1)(j) of RTI Act provides that personal information need not be disclosed unless the larger public interest justifies it.  If the information is personal or would amount to invasion of privacy of the individual, what the Public Information Officer has to satisfy is whether the larger public interest justifies the disclosure. The Bombay High Court said that the Regulations framed under the Indian Medical Council Act, will have to be read with Section 8(1) (j) of the Right to Information Act. If a spouse is subjected to suffering because of incurable disease of other spouse, it is a ground for divorce. Section 13(i)(v) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, provides that a marriage can be dissolved on the ground that the other party has been incurably of unsound mind, or has been suffering continuously or intermittently from mental disorder of such a kind and to such an extent that the petitioner cannot reasonably be expected to live with the respondent Information about one...

The arbitration clause in an agreement can be separated from the main contract and each can be decided independently, the Supreme Court has stated in the judgment, Ashapura Mine-Chem Ltd vs Gujarat Mineral Development Corporation. The Supreme Court set aside the judgment of the Gujarat high court which took the wrong view, against precedents. In this case, the Corporation entered into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) under which Ashapura proposed to constitute a joint venture along with a Chinese company as well as the Gujarat Corporation for setting up an alumina plant in Kutch. When differences cropped up, the Corporation cancelled the MoU, which provoked Ashapura to approach the high court for appointment of an arbitrator. The request was rejected as the high court felt that the MoU having been cancelled, there was no question of arbitration. On appeal, the Supreme Court stated that though the joint venture failed to take off, the arbitration clause in the MoU would operate as a...

The Supreme Court has held as illegal a customs evaluation rule which allowed the authorities to impose 1 per cent as notional cost of handling charges on goods even if the actual cost is declared. This will benefit especially software companies, which do not import heavy goods. In this case, Wipro Ltd vs Collector of Customs, the computer firm imported software components. It showed handling charges as Rs 65 per kg as per the tariff at Chennai airport. However, the authorities applied Rule 9(2)(ii) as amended in 1990 and added Rs 15,214 per kg to the handling charges. The company challenged the rule in the Madras High Court. It dismissed the petition, leading to the appeal. The Supreme Court set aside the high court ruling and stated that the amended rule was illegal. It did not quash the illegal rule, but read it down and decreed that the clause would apply only when the actual charges are not ascertainable. Article referred: http://www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/cu...

The Bombay High Court has ruled that if a company involved in a dispute has sought arbitration, its lenders must wait for the proceedings to conclude before taking steps to get their money back. The court directed a consortium of lenders led by IDBI to wait for arbitrators to pass an interim award in a row between road builder Kalyan Sangam Infratech and the Maharashtra government before moving to recover Rs 250 crore owed by the company. If the dues aren't paid by June 30, after the arbitration is over, then the lenders can sell shares pledged by the company, Justice GS Patel said in his order dated April 10. Kalyan Sangam Infratech, which was contracted to build a bridge in the state, is seeking compensation from the government after toll for some users was reduced. Kalyan Sangam Infratech was incorporated in 2008 to construct the South Kasheli and North Kasheli bridge in Thane district on a build, operate and transfer basis. A tax policy announced in July 2009 gave vehicles...

In first of its kind, Madras High court has passed an order based on WhatsApp posts. A PWD staffer, G. Parthiban had, in his WhatsApp posts, allegedly abused and threatened the petitioner, H.B. Saravana Kumar, a law graduate, for filing a RTI petition with Thanjavur East police station seeking certain details regarding him. Kumar, in the RTI petition, sought of the police answers to a few quarries relating to the arrest and remand of Parthiban in 2014. Soon after filing the petition, Kumar received a phone call on April 15 reportedly from Velayutham, Sub-Inspector, Thanjavur East police station who made some basic enquires regarding the RTI application. Thereafter, Kumar received a series of calls from Parthiban threatening and abusing him using unparliamentary words profusely. Parthiban warned him stating that several leading advocates and a sitting Madras high court judge were his relatives. These conversations recorded by him were posted by him on WhatsApp  and this had raise...

Lower courts should not include every other individual pinned down by the police as an accused in criminal cases without calling for materials to prove their involvement and getting satisfied, prima facie, about the need to prosecute them, the Madras High Court Bench here has said. Justice S. Nagamuthu made the observation while setting aside an order passed by a Judicial Magistrate at Uthamapalayam in Theni district on March 12, 2007 including two individuals as additional accused in a cheating case at the mere asking of the Rayappanpatti police and without any basis. The judge pointed out that the police had initially booked the case against only one individual. Subsequently, an Assistant Public Prosecutor filed a petition under Section 319 of the Code of Criminal Procedure requesting the Magistrate to add two more individuals as accused in the case. The petition did not contain any detail about the materials available with the prosecution to array the two as additional accused an...

The difference between a fall due to ill health, and a genuine accidental fall, would determine whether a claim under an accident insurance policy is payable or not. Case Study: Kishan Lal Jain suffered a fall in his bedroom on March 16, 2009, resulting in a serious head injury. He was admitted to Jaslok Hospital and kept in the ICU. The hospital had registered a medico-legal case and reported it to Gamdevi police station, which recorded his statement. Kishan Lal was discharged in two days. On March 23, 2009, Kishan Lal had another fall at home, injuring his head once again. He was admitted to Jaslok in an unconscious state, where he expired on April 7, 2009 due to cardio-respiratory failure. Later, in July 2009, his son Pravinkumar came across an individual personal accident insurance policy obtained by his deceased father from New India Assurance. Pravinkumar lodged a claim under the policy. The insurance company rejected it, saying the claim had neither been filed in time n...

The Supreme Court on Monday said that divorced Muslim women are entitled to seek maintenance from their ex-husbands under the Criminal Procedure Code which provides the same relief to wives, children and parents. A bench of justices Dipak Misra and Prafulla C Pant referred several judgements of the apex court where law has been settled that a magistrate can grant maintenance to a divorced Muslim woman and parameters and considerations are the same as stipulated in Section 125 of the CrPC. Section 125 of the CrPC deals with order for maintenance for wives, kids and parents if any person having sufficient means neglects or refuses to maintain them. Dealing with the issue of applicability of Section 125 CrPC to a Muslim woman who has been divorced, the bench upheld a trial court's order which had directed a man to pay Rs 4,000 maintenance to his divorced wife. It said, "there can be no shadow of doubt that Section 125 CrPC has been rightly held to be applicable by the fa...

The Punjab State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Chandigarh, has held the United India Insurance Company Limited guilty of deficiency in service for rejecting a claim by "misreading and misconstruing" the terms of policy. It has directed the firm to pay to the complainant Rs 1,40,345 with interest at the rate of 9% per annum from the date of repudiation (February 8, 2012) and also pay Rs 25,000 as compensation for harassment. The complaint was filed by Kamlendra Kanwar of Sector 30, Chandigarh, and his wife against the insurance company from which they had been taking health insurance policies for the last several years. The latest policy was for the period August 26, 2011, to August 25, 2012. In addition to that he had taken "Top up" medicare policy for the same period. After Kanwar's wife, Sushma, fell ill, a claim of Rs 1,40,345 was lodged under the Top-up policy. The counsel for the insured contended that the claim was wrongly repudiated on...

A bank cannot freeze the account of an employee on the request of the employer and become a judge of dispute between them, a consumer forum here has said while holding IDBI Bank Ltd guilty of deficiency for doing so. A bench of New Delhi District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, presided by C K Chaturevdi, made the observation while asking IDBI Bank Ltd to pay  Rs. 20,000 to Delhi resident Om Prakash Sharma, noting that his account was freezed from December 23 to 27, 2010, on his employer’s request and without any intimation to him. “In our considered view, the bank cannot become a judge of dispute between the employer and employee and freeze the account of employee on the request of employer. Such a right belongs to Court or police on investigation can resort to such a request,” the forum said, adding the bank did a “negligence act” in freezing Sharma’s account. It asked the bank to pay a compensation of Rs. 20,000 for deficiency and litigation charges while holding the ...

bserving that there can be "absolutely no justification for delays in verification of sureties", a bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw directed Delhi Police, including Jail Superintendants and SHOs, to "complete process of verification of local sureties within 10 days and outstation sureties latest within three weeks". "Our direction aforesaid should not be understood as giving time of 10 days and three weeks, as the case may be, for verification. The process of verification, should be immediate, maximum within 24 hours, as there is absolutely no justification" for the State to keep a prisoner who has been granted bail for its own delays. "The time limit fixed by us is the maximum and which maximum is to be availed of only in difficult cases and not to be made a norm. It should not be that verifications which now are being done sooner, are also delayed," the court said. It also said the police officer on whose ac...

Observing that imposition of onerous and stringent conditions amount to denial of bail, the Madras High Court has set aside an order of a lower court directing nine persons accused of dacoity to deposit Rs 25,000 each as cash security for availing bail. Allowing petitions by the nine accused, Justice P Devadass quashed the bail order of Tirupattur Assistant Sessions Judge holding that it was totally not in accordance with law. He directed the petitioners, charged with offences of dacoity and causing death or grievous injuries, to furnish own bail bond for Rs.5,000 each to the satisfaction of the Superintendent of Central Prison at Vellore. ”Imposition of onerous and stringent conditions amount to denial of bail. Actually, our bail system is not mainly based on any cash system. If it is so, poor people have to spend rest of their life in jail itself. The object of bail is to enable the accused to go out of jail with an assurance to return to the Court to put up an effective defense.”...