High Court fines two doctors Rs 2,000 each for discourtesy

Saurabh Malik

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 6

In an out of the ordinary judgment, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has made it clear that a petitioner’s failure to appear before the Bench after the answering of his prayers could be construed as discourtesy, leading to the imposition of costs.

The Division Bench of Justice Mahesh Grover and Justice Mahabir Singh Sindhu also imposed costs of Rs 2,000 each on two petitioner doctors, after they demonstrated discourtesy by not appearing before the Bench after their prayer for admission was rendered infructuous.

The Bench directed that the costs imposed on Dr Sagar Khera and Dr Rajesh Kapoor were required to be deposited before the Mediation and Conciliation Centre within a month of receiving the order’s certified copy.

The two doctors had moved the High Court against the Director General of Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research and another respondent. Both the petitions were brought to a logical conclusion in less than a month after giving short adjournments.

As the case came up for resumed hearing before the Bench, PGIMER counsel Amit Jhanji stated that Dr Khera in the counselling got internal medicine, a stream of his choice. Similarly, Dr Kapoor got paediatrics, again a stream of his choice. Jhanji added that since this was the petitioners’ claim in both the petitions, their consideration in the counselling and acceptance of the stream had rendered the matter infructuous.

The Bench asserted that there was no representation on behalf of the petitioners to either accept or reject the submission made by the counsel for the respondent. As such, while accepting the statement made by the counsel for the respondent, the petitions were being dismissed as having become infructuous.

“But before parting with the order, we notice lack of courtesy by the petitioners in not appearing before this court,” the Bench added. Elaborating, the Bench asserted a great urgency was demonstrated during the course of proceedings. Noticing the same, the Bench granted short adjournments and spent considerable time on the matter. But the petitioners’ absence was discourtesy to the court. “We, therefore, impose costs of Rs 2,000 each on the petitioners in both the petitions,” the Bench concluded.