Defamation case pending in CJM (west) court for more than a decade, no solution in sight

By Our Correspondent

Agartala, July 25, 2024

India is perhaps the only constitutional democracy in the world where more than five crores of cases have been pending in courts and out of this humongous number 1.80 lakh cases have been pending for more than thirty years. This coupled with other interesting anecdotes of sluggishness in workings of our court was highlighted recently in an article in a national daily by the state’s former PCCF and principal secretary Dr V.K.Bauguna. This has however not resulted in any corrective action so far .

But Bahuguna cited his personal experience of working of our court and legal system in the context of a defamation case he had filed in the chief judicial magistrate’s (CJM) court at Agartala (west Tripura). Acccording to the version given by the veteran bureaucrat and leading social activist, he had filed the defamation case Cr 337 in the year 2014 but after six years the petitioner was made an accused in the case through twisting and obfuscation of facts and circumstances and the real accused’s disobedience of the judicial process is yet to come to light.

The case relates to an undersecretary who worked under Mr Bahuguna in Govt of India and who wrote false defamatory emails against him to Chief Minister and other officers of Tripura. The CJM after issuing repeated Summons finally issued a warrant against him at his address as mentioned in his Aaadhar card and other records. A proclamation/ look-out notice was also pasted on his address C-487 apartment sector 19, Rohini, Delhi. But he evaded and only in 2018 surrendered before Agartala High Court through CRL PTN case 44 of 2018, but before surrendering he had changed his residence to a nearby place. The then Chief Justice of Tripura based on his petition accepted his plea without verification of the facts and quashed the arrest warrant, ostensibly agreeing that summons had been sent to wrong address.

Taking advantage of this to wriggle out of his defamatory activity the under-secretary filed a counter defamation case 4/2020 stating that summons had been sent to wrong address and he got defamed because of this. The Judicial magistrate admitted the case despite knowing full well through an affidavit filed by advocate of Dr Bahuguna, giving details that it was the only address available and in which he in September 2014 had acknowledged the summon of Tripura police in another FIR filed by Dr Bahuguna. Despite this fact the judicial magistrate has not taken action on Dr Bahuguna's affidavit. Is it extra caution by him or what is it? This is a simple case based on documents, yet the case has been running for last 10 years. Many legal experts have opined that actual people centric justice will dawn on us when the lower judiciary is prompt and proactive in deciding cases and the High Courts do monitor the accountability aspects. But this is not happening in the defamation case filed by Dr V.K.Bahuguna a decade ago.