ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Friday imposed a fine of Rs100,000 on the Ministry of Defence for abusing the process of law for filing a vexatious and frivolous claims and thus wasting the precious time of courts.

A three-judge bench comprising Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail and Justice Shahid Waheed rejected the plea moved by the defence ministry against the dismissal of their plea by the Lahore High Court on Sept 7, 2020.

Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, in a four-page order he authored, imposed a fine of Rs100,000 and directed the petitioner to deposit the costs in a charitable organisation of their choice within a month from the receipt of the order and acknowledged the same to the Supreme Court registrar for perusal of judges in chambers.

The case concerns filing of a suit by the defence ministry for the recovery of Rs912,801 against Ms Farrukh International (Pvt) Ltd through its proprietor Mrs Firdous Munawar (respondent) on account of breach of a contract awarded to for the supply of certain food items.

Petitioner wasted court time by filing ‘frivolous claim’, bench observes

A civil judge of Rawalpindi through a Feb 22, 2014 decree had dismissed the suit, holding that the petitioners had failed to prove their claim. The appeal filed against the judgement and decree of the trial court was also first dismissed by additional district judge of Rawalpindi and then by the Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi bench.

The SC in its order observed that the petitioners had relied on a contract that admittedly pertains to financial and future obligations and therefore the initial burden of proving the case and the documents was on the petitioner.

Despite the fact that the defendant was proceeded against ex-parte, the trial court in order to satisfy itself with regard to the execution of certain documents to prove the case, exercised its discretion by asking the petitioner to produce evidence in their support, the judgement recalled.

It said the law provided a procedure for production of documents through the person concerned along with its original record. If the procedure for production of the document was not followed in the manner prescribed by law, the same could not be taken into consideration, the apex court explained.

According to the court order, the petitioner produced the document through their representative who neither prepared nor attested the same. Even the original record of the documents was not produced in the trial court for comparison. Besides, production of the marginal witnesses of the documents in the court is a condition but the needful was not done. Thus, the petitioners have failed to prove the execution of the documents relied upon, the order said, adding the courts below after proper adjudication of the matter concurrently refused to grant relief to the petitioners and dismissed the suit.

Published in Dawn, May 7th, 2023