Allahabad HC Issues Contempt Notice To Lawyer Accused Of Stalking Lady Judge
The advocate stalked a lady judicial officer on Facebook and sent her obnoxious messages. He also used to come to her court without any work and stare at her continuously.
The Allahabad High Court recently issued show cause notice to an advocate as to why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against him for levelling baseless insulting allegations, scandalizing and undermining the authority and dignity of the court.
Advocate Abhay Pratap, a practicing lawyer in District Court Maharajganj (UP), is accused of sending obnoxious messages to a lady judicial officer via Facebook and her official mobile number.
Last month, the high court had cancelled the bail granted to the advocate by the lower court. While passing the said order, a single judge bench had also directed the high court Registry to place the matter before the appropriate bench for taking suo moto cognizance of the criminal contempt committed by the advocate.
In pursuance of the same, the matter got placed before a division bench of Justices Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Vinod Diwakar.
The division bench noted that prima facie the act of the accused advocate amounted to criminal contempt referred to in Section 2 (c) of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.
Accordingly, the bench issued notice to the advocate and sought his reply.
The allegations against the advocate are that when the lady judicial officer was posted as Civil Judge (Junior Division)/Judicial Magistrate in District Court Maharajganj, Pratap, who is a practicing Advocate in the same court, started sending obnoxious messages and casting certain remarks through messages on her Facebook account.
On noticing Pratap's messages, the judicial officer blocked Pratap on Facebook, however, Pratap got her official number and started sending messages on that. In two of the messages, Pratap had written: “I love you...”, and “Is janam me nahi to agle janam me tujhe pane ki koshish prayas karta rahunga aur ho sake to sato janam”.
Moreover, Pratap used to come to the judicial officer's court without any work and gazed at her continuously.
The lady judicial officer then lodged an FIR at Kotwali police station in Maharajganj and also sent a representation to the high court through District Judge, Maharajganj.
Pratap got arrested, however, a few days later, Sessions Judge granted him bail which got cancelled last month by the high court.
Case Title: In Re v. Abhay Pratap