The Supreme Court on Friday issued a strict warning to lawyers who take a chance to abuse judges. In a case from Kerala where a lawyer was sentenced to three months in prison with a fine of `1,000 as punishment for contempt, the Bench said, “This institution is strong enough to withstand many stones. But we will not tolerate a single one to be thrown at it.”
The case related to one CK Mohanan, a lawyer from the Kerala High Court who had acted inappropriately while arguing a habeas corpus petition. He was representing the parents of a girl who got abducted and the parents alleged that their girl could have fallen into the hands of persons who deliberately abduct Hindu girls and marry them off after converting them to Islam. The parents told the Court that they did not want to engage Mohanan as their counsel anymore following which he began abusing the Court for engaging in “backdoor practices”.
Despite given opportunities to apologize, Mohanan did not relent and this conduct angered the bench. To make matters worse, the lawyer brought an article written by legal academician Upendra Baxi to make an allegation against one of the judges sitting on the bench.
Finding the conduct of the lawyer contumacious, the HC on November 1, 2016 sentenced Mohanan to undergo three months in prison and a fine of Rs 1000. Challenging this verdict, Mohanan approached the apex court.
A bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Ashok Bhushan found no justification for the lawyer’s conduct and felt that the HC had let him off when the highest punishment under the Contempt of Courts Act for such conduct was six months’ imprisonment. Further, the bench discovered that the lawyer brought disrepute to him following the incident after the entire Kerala HC Bar Association disowned him.
The bench said, “Why do you persist in proving you are a misfitIJ You continue to throw stones at the institution that we will not tolerate. The entire HC Bar, lock, stock, and barrel have disowned you.” Asking the lawyer to deposit the fine within two weeks, the bench decided to examine the issue but warned the erring lawyer’s counsel R Sathish, “The punishment could go up…This institution is strong enough to withstand many stones; but we will not tolerate a single one to be thrown at it.”