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The Delhi High Court on Wednesday, 23 May, came down heavily on NDTV for wasting the court’s time by constantly using delaying tactics in its own suit against MJ Akbar and The Sunday Guardian filed seven years ago.
NDTV had sought damages of Rs 25 crore and an injunction on the publication of the said articles. However, ever since the framing of the issues, both the plaintiff as well as the defendants had been delaying the case by taking adjournments and not filing the required documents.
The court, in its judgment, noted that NDTV had availed as many as 11 opportunities to lead evidence, each time asking for adjournment, and a condonation of delay thereafter. The defendants, it was noted, also dragged their feet after the Joint Registrar adjourned the suit for the defendants’ evidence.
The single judge bench of Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw observed that:
Taking a dim view of the conduct of both parties during the suit, the Court observed:
Subsequently, NDTV had filed a chamber appeal against the decision of the Joint Registrar to close its evidence. While arguing on condonation of delay in filing the same, senior advocate Arvind Nayar had submitted that the suit was for a large sum of money and that his client had paid Rs. 25 lakh in court fees.
The bench, at this juncture, asked whether a litigant, by paying court fees of lakhs of rupees, gets a right to purchase the time of the court. It was observed that:
The Court also stated that NDTV woke up from its slumber only on realising that the game of “tarikh pe tarikh” which it had been playing, was about to come to an end.
The bench, therefore, dismissed the suit and reiterated that the procedure and time of the court is not for sale and is not to be regulated by the litigants, but by the Court.
(This article was originlly published on Bar and Bench and has been republished here with permission)
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