The Madras High Court Bench here has imposed a cost of Rs. 1,000 on a litigant for filing a case accusing Tirunelveli Mayor E. Bhuvaneshwari of having taken a bribe of Rs. 2 lakh from the leaseholder of the paid public toilet in the new bus stand.
Agreeing with Additional Advocate General K. Chellapandian that there was no merit in the case filed by the petitioner, Subramanian, Justice S. Nagamuthu directed the litigant to pay the cost to the Chief Justice’s Relief Fund and report to the court by April 27.
The judge pointed out that the present petition had been filed seeking a direction to the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption to register a First Information Report against the Mayor and others on the basis of a complaint lodged by him on November 24.
According to the complainant, the Assistant Commissioner of Melapalayam zone had issued a show-cause notice to the leaseholder, Sakthi Kumar, last year seeking explanation as to why his lease should not be cancelled for having violated certain terms and conditions.
The lease holder did not reply to the notice and hence an agenda was placed before the Corporation for cancelling the lease granted to him. However, no further action was taken against him since he paid a hefty amount of money to the Mayor, the complainant alleged.
During the course of arguments on the petition seeking registration of FIR, his counsel felt that there was no merit in the case and urged the court to permit him to withdraw the plea. The judge said he would accept his plea but not without a rider since valuable time of the court had been wasted.
Submission recorded
Hence, after consulting his client, the lawyer offered to pay a cost of Rs. 1,000 and also made an endorsement that he did not want to pursue the case anymore. The judge recorded the submission and ordered the High Court Registry to list the matter on April 27 for reporting compliance.
