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Synopsis

The Madras High Court has recently set aside a single judge bench order directing the Madras Bar Association (MBA) to pay Rs 5 lakh as compensation for an incident involving a lawyer being denied access to water in the Association's office premises.

The division bench of Justices S Vaidyanathan and K Rajasekar was dealing with an appeal filed by the MBA against a single judge bench order dated June 22, 2023 passed in a writ petition moved by Advocate Elephant G Rajendran.

The impugned order, issued by Justice SM Subramaniam had directed the MBA to pay the compensation to Advocate Rajendran, whose son R Neil Rashan, a junior lawyer (since dead), was allegedly prevented from accessing water at the Association's office by a senior advocate because he was not a member of the MBA.

The single judge bench had further directed the MBA to distribute admission forms to all lawyers interested in becoming members and to consider applications without any discrimination based on religious, social, or economic status.

The counsel for the Bar Association argued that although the petitioner had filed the writ petition stating it to be in the public interest, he was espousing a personal cause through it.  Moreover, he contended that through the writ petition, the petitioner had sought a direction for disposal of his representation before the Registrar General of the high court pertaining to his grievances, therefore, the single judge bench had erred in issuing orders to the Bar Association regarding its membership policy, etc. 

However, the petitioner argued that his petitioner was indeed not a public interest litigation and also, in substance, the prayers made by him in the petition were only against the Madras Bar Association.

The division bench noted that the entire alleged episode of denying access to water to the petitioner's son was disputed and therefore, the high court, under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, could not go into such disputed question of fact.

Further, on the face of record, the lis appears to be private in nature, but, a lengthy order has been passed in the Writ Petition on the premise that it is a Public Interest Litigation, the division bench pointed out. 

Furthermore, regarding the maintainability of the petition before the single judge bench, the division bench opined that the writ petition ought to have been transmitted to be placed before the Chief Justice, as it involved a question pertaining to the administrative decision with regard to listing.

"At the risk of repetition, we would like to emphasize that in terms of Rule 17(1)(v) of the Writ Rules, when the relief sought in the Writ Petition is against the Registrar General of this Court, the matter has to be heard by a Division Bench to which the case is assigned by the Hon'ble Chief Justice," the bench said.

The division bench said that even according to the writ petitioner, there was a public cause, hence, the writ petition should have been heard only as a Public Interest Litigation.

"Therefore, if it is a Public Interest Litigation, the learned Single Judge has no jurisdiction to take up the matter, in the light of Rule 17(1)(v) of the Writ Rules, as per which, the matter has to be heard and decided only by the Division Bench and if it is not a Public Interest Litigation, then, the directions given by the learned Single Judge in the Writ Petition, cannot hold good," the division bench held. 

It opined that unless the order of the single judge was set aside, the matter could not be transmitted to the division bench, as a writ petition seeking a relief against the registrar general of the high court, can be heard only by a division bench and not by a single judge.

Apart that, the division bench observed that the allegation of the writ petitioner that there was discrimination on the basis of caste in the Madras Bar Association was far-fetched.

"Admittedly, Mr.Neil Rashan was not a member of the Madras Bar Association. Entitlement to enter into the Association and enjoy the benefits would flow only to the members and not all persons can make a grievance and seek redressal of the grievance, when the entity is an autonomous one, but merely granted a public space," said the bench. 

It emphasised that the lawyers' community, by itself, forms a separate class and it is open to any Association to decide about the membership of the specific Association, and if membership has been arbitrarily denied, the said person can question the same before the appropriate forum.

In the case on hand, there is no such relief claimed by filing a separate Petition, the bench highlighted. 

In light of the same, the bench held that it did not want to intervene in the membership process of the Appellant Association so long as no violation of by-law was claimed and if there was any violation, it was open to the aggrieved party to go before the appropriate forum to seek redressal.

Regarding the compensation of Rs.5,00,000 ordered by the singled judge bench, the division bench held that when the dispute itself was beyond the adjudication of the writ court, the single judge had gone beyond the scope of the writ petition and moulded and granted reliefs, in exercise of extraordinary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, which could not be sustained.

Therefore, court set aside that the impugned order passed by the single judge in its entirety, by pointing out that the writ petition could have been taken up only by a division bench and also on the further ground that the alleged victim and the alleged aggressor were no more.

Case Title: The Secretary, Madras Bar Association, High Court v. Elephant G. Rajendran and Others with connected matters