Contempt of Courts

Civil Contempt and Its Defences what may be

Pleaded
 Categorisation of Contempt of
Court
As per the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 the
category is of 2 types-
• Civil Contempt
• Criminal Contempt
These are defined in following way-
civil contempt means wilful disobedience to any
judgment, decree, direction, order, writ or other
process of a court or wilful breach of an undertaking
given to a court.
 Criminal Contempt
Criminal Contempt means the publication (whether by words,
spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or
otherwise) of any matter or the doing of any other act
whatsoever which
(i) scandalises or tends to scandalise, or lowers or tends to lower
the authority of, any court; or
(ii) prejudices, or interferes or tends to interfere with, the due
course of any judicial proceeding; or
(iii) interferes or tends to interfere with, or obstructs or tends to
obstruct, the administration of justice in any other manner.
 Defences for Civil Contempt

The defence to a contemner in Civil Contempt can

be considered under following headings:
(1) Disobedience or breach of undertaking was
not wilful- Under cases of Civil Contempt, it is
necessry that there has been wilful disobedience to
any judgment, decree, direction, order, writ or other
process of a court or wilful breach of an
undertaking given to a court contd…
 Contd…..

In case, the contemner is successful to prove

that there was no wilful disobedience or breach of
undertaking given to a court, he may be absolved of
the liability of civil contempt. In his defence, the
contemner can plead of the disobedience or breach
of undertaking given to a court which was not
wilful.
 Court’s Order passed without
Jurisdiction
Where an order of the court has been passed
without jurisdiction, the disobedience of that order
will be a defence for the accused person in a
contempt proceeding. An order passed by a court
having no jurisdiction over that matter, can be
disobeyed, as there can be no violation of the order
of that court which had no jurisdiction to pass the
order.
 Order Disobeyed is Vague on the
record
The ambiguity in the order of the Court is a valid
defence to the contemner in contempt proceedings.
So the order of the court must not be vague for
obedience by the parties.
In R.M. Ramaul v. State of Himachal Pradesh,
(1991Cr.l.J. 1415 (SC) the Supreme Court directed
the corporation to restore the seniority of the
petitioner in service notionally from the anterior
date, and such direction was carried out by treating
him contd…
 Contd…..

as promoted with effect from a particular date

without a monetary benefit for that period. The
Supreme Court held that since there was no specific
direction with regard to monetary benefits in the
order, the violation for which was complained,
technically there was no case of contempt.
 Niaz Mohammed v. State of
Haryana AIR 1995 SC 308
The Supreme Court had by its order directed the
government to fix the scale of pay of instructors
working in the Education Department of Haryana
with effect from the date of their initial appointment
by ignoring certain breaks in service. In the
contempt petition it was alleged that by not paying
the arrears of salary to the instructors in terms of the
order of the Supreme Court, the respondents
contd…
 Contd…..

Has committed contempt.

The Court held that since there was
no specific direction in the order to pay any
particular amount to any Instructor, there was no
contempt on the part of the respondent.
 Atma Ram Kanoria v.
L.K.R.Prasad (1990) 1 Cr. L.J. 169
It would be a valid defence to a contempt
proceeding to plead and establish that the order of
the court is vague.
Facts of the case- the Calcutta High
Court gave a direction to the Municipal Authorities
to grant sanction “as expeditiously as possible and
preferably within a period of two weeks from that
date.” In contempt proceedings contd…
 Contd…..

Initiated for non-compliance of the direction, the

High Court held that since there was no specific
time limit, such non-compliance could not be
regarded as wilful or deliberate disregard of such
direction.
 When the Question of Interpretation
of the Order is involved.
In S.K. Saha v. Gokul Chandra Dhara (1988) Cr.
L.J. 21 it has been held that a proceeding for Civil
Contempt can not be predicated upon the
disobedience of the order or direction which
provides scope for different reasonable and rational
interpretation.
This view has been reiterated by the S.C.in
Contd…
 Contd…..

Hari Nath Sharma v. Jaipur development

Authority (1995) 4 SCC 25 where it was held that
where two views are possible as to the effect of
Court Order and the respondent acts on the basis of
one such views, it can not be said that he had
disobeyed the order of the Court.
 Compliance of direction in the order is
dependent upon determination of other facts

In Attorney General v. Walthamstow, U.D.C. (1895)

11 TLR 533 it has been held in the case of
disobedience of positive orders, that it is the duty of
the party concerned to find out the proper means of
obeying the order. It would be a valid defence to say
that the compliance with the order was impossible.
In Mohd. Iqbal Khandey v. Abdul Majid Rather AIR
1994 SC 2252 Sc has directed that contempt
proceeding should not be initiated where it is
impossible to comply with the order of the court.
 Ignorance of Court’s Order
Ignorance of court’s order is a valid defence for the person
against whom contempt proceedings are to be undertaken.
Like Prafulla Kumar Sadhukhan v. Murari Hait (1989) Cr.
L.J. 39 (Calcutta), where party continues to make construction
of a boundary wall prior to receiving an order of status quo
under Section 144 (2) of Cr.P.C. and without the knowledge
of the order, there is no question of contempt.
In Sukumar Mukhopadhyay v. T.D. Karamchandani (1995)
Cr. L.J. 1610 (Calcutta) it was held that when a person is
charged with violation of mandatory order, he can
successfully plead in defence that order was not formally
served to him.