Bombay high court pulls up BMC counsel, wants them replaced

MUMBAI: In a setback to the BMC, the Bombay high court reminded counsel for the civic body to know their responsibility of placing correct facts before court and directed that the city’s civic administration replaces all its junior counsels with a fresh lot.
“Every court functions on the basis of trust,” said the HC bench of Justices SJ Kathawalla and BP Colabawalla on Friday.“Since it is impossible for the court to go through each and every page of the affidavit or pleadings, the court accepts statements made by advocates before court, presuming the advocate making the statement understands his/her responsibilities as an officer of the court,” it added. The court was hearing a civil contempt plea filed by a developer for non-compliance of a 2017 order for demolition of some structures.
The lawyer for BMC placed an order with pages that were mixed up, argued advocate Rohan Mahadik for the developer. Based on the BMC affidavit, the court had on January 8 passed an order with certain directions to the city civil court for swift hearing of an application which the BMC lawyer said was pending. But Mahadik on January 24 pointed out the matter before the lower court had already been disposed of.
The HC, faced with a piquant situation, said it was “incumbent on the part of the advocate/s to ensure no incorrect facts are put on affidavit as well as before court, failing which the court will be misled into passing incorrect orders done in the present matter.” The BMC said out of 34 unauthorized structures, it had demolished 28 and is unable to demolish 6 because of the order passed by the city civil court directing it to maintain status quo. “On 8th January, 2020... panel counsel of the corporation (not in-house advocate) submitted that city civil court is hearing” an application filed in 2015. And that the next date was January 15. The HC recorded civic counsel Jaymala Oswal’s statement and based on it, passed orders on January 8.
On Mahadik saying the civic counsel had made an incorrect statement as the application was disposed of in October 2015, the civic counsel “realized she had on 8th January made an incorrect statement.” But HC said “if counsel made an incorrect statement on 8th January, 2020 and realised her mistake on 15th January, she ought to have informed this court immediately and sought recall of the order giving directions to the city civil court... However, she did not do so despite the matter being shown on the cause list on 16th January.” The HC said it was “shocked to note” BMC has annexed an order containing two pages of one order and the last page was from another matter. “It’s an amalgam of two orders.” The BMC pays Rs 50,000 per matter to advocates on its junior panel ‘A’. “However, we have repeatedly noted assistance given by some panel advocates to court is not at all satisfactory,” the HC said.