Willful disobedience of the order of the court will amount to contempt: High Court of Uttarakhand.
Where the court had ordered for regularization of service of the petitioner and the opposite party willfully disobeyed that order, then it would be considered as contempt of court. A single Judge bench comprising Hon’ble Justice Manoj Kumar Tiwari, in the matter of Puran Singh Bisht Vs. Ashok Kumar & others (CONTEMPT PETITION NO. 462 OF 2019), dealt with an issue where the petitioner filed a contempt petition alleging willful disobedience of the final order passed in Special Appeal No. 118 of 2008.
In the present, the petitioner has alleged in the contempt petition that the opposite parties had wilfully violated the order of this Court, and thereby as per such order the petitioner’s service was to be regularized, but it had not been regularized. The counsel for the petitioner that Special Appeal was decided four months after passing of dismissal order, therefore, the direction issued by Division Bench to implement the judgment rendered by Allahabad High Court mandated the respondents to regularize the service of the petitioner, but the respondents did not obey the order. A response affidavit had been filed by Mr. Nitin Singh Bhadauria, Collector/District Magistrate, Almora. It was stated that the petitioner was removed from service after filling of the charge sheet. It was further been stated that the petitioner’s representation, made to District Magistrate, was rejected vide order dated 20.08.2018.
The court observed – “Since petitioner was dismissed from service by way of penalty and he unsuccessfully challenged the said dismissal order, therefore, the contention made on behalf of the petitioner is without any substance that despite the operation of the dismissal order, petitioner’s services were required to be regularized, and non-regularisation of service amounts to contempt.” Thereby notice was issued to opposite parties and the contempt petition was closed.