The fake respondent faked an entire compromise from the side of the original respondent, and got a favourable order from the Supreme Court.
Photo : PTI
In a surprising case, the Supreme Court withdrew its ruling in a land dispute case after it found that the favourable verdict was reached through a fake settlement by a “ghost” respondent. A report in PTI stated that an SC bench of Justices PS Narasimha and Joymalya Bagchi asked the registry of the top court to conduct an inquiry and file a report within three weeks. The court also warned of an FIR to bring the guilty to book.
So, what happened?
On December 13 last year, the apex court quashed the order of a Muzaffarpur trial court and the Patna High Court. According to PTI, the order was based on a purported compromise agreement between the petitioner and the respondent.
Later, it was found that the respondent was an impostor and the real respondent, Harish Jaiswal, had no idea of the proceedings.
Jaiswal, who hails from Muzaffarpur in Bihar, came to know about the case after his son-in-law discovered it on the Supreme Court’s website five months later.
So, he approached the court. “The petitioner has not only acted in violation of legal and ethical norms but has also committed a fraud upon this court, which, if not rectified, will embolden such mala fide litigants to continue their deceitful practices,” his plea said.
In the original order, it was found that four advocates appeared for the fake respondent. But during the fresh hearing, a lawyer, who had appeared previously, told the bench that he is 80 years old and hadn’t practised law in recent times, the report added.