HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE GHULAM MOHAMMED AND HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE P. SWAROOP REDDY C.C.No. 507 of 2010 Date: 09-11-2010 Between Paluru Prameelamma ……….. Petitioner and Paluru Subramanyam and others …….. Respondents HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE GHULAM MOHAMMED AND HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE P. SWAROOP REDDY C.C.No. 507 of 2010 ORDER: (Per GM, J) This contempt case is filed alleging willful disobedience of the order dated 01-04-2008 passed by this Court in C.M.A. No.922 of 2007. 2. The brief facts are, the first respondent-plaintiff filed O.S.No.7 of 2007 on the file of the III Additional District Judge, Kurnool at Nandyal for partition and separate possession against the petitioner- contemnor. During the pendency of the same, the petitioner- contemnor filed I.A.No.1489 of 2007 seeking to appoint a Receiver to take charge of the suit schedule property. The trial Court allowed the I.A. by the order, dated 06-11-2007. Aggrieved by the same, the first respondent-plaintiff filed the said C.M.A. before this Court and this Court on 01-04-2008 passed following consent order: “Today, Sri P. Venugopal, learned counsel for the plaintiff-appellant herein, on instructions, submits that the plaintiff-appellant herein is willing to deposit an amount of Rs.1,50,000/- per annum to which, Sri O. Manohar Reddy, learned counsel for the first respondent-first defendant reports no objection. Admittedly, the suit is filed for partition and the dispute is between the members of one family. In view of the above arrangement, the impugned order dated 6-11-2007 is set aside and the plaintiff-appellant herein is permitted to take charge of the suit schedule property item Nos.1 to 14 and to manage the property subject to depositing to the credit of the suit OS No.7 of 2007 a sum of Rs.1,50,000/- (One Lack Fifty Thousand Only) per annum on 10th January of every succeeding year, till the disposal of the suit. Out of the amount that is now directed to be deposited by the plaintiff, the plaintiff-appellant herein is permitted to withdraw the amount to the extent of his 9/40th share and other respondents-defendants are also permitted to withdraw the amounts in proportionate to their shares. This arrangement is purely tentative and only for the purpose of distributing the amounts to be deposited by the plaintiff every year, as directed above. 3. Subsequent to the passing of the above order, the first respondent-plaintiff filed C.M.P.No.46 of 2009 seeking extension of time to comply with the said order, and this Court by the order, dated 06-02-2009 granted one month time from that day. Thereafter, the first respondent-plaintiff filed another C.M.P.No.710 of 2009 seeking extension of time by 13 days for the same purpose, and this Court extended the time accordingly. But, till date, the first respondent- plaintiff did not deposit the amount as per the order passed by this Court in the C.M.A. 4. Sri O. Manohar Reddy, learned counsel for the petitioner- contemnor, contended that the first respondent-plaintiff, having got the benefit and advantage of the order in the appeal, which is a consent order, raised the crop, harvested the same and sold it and now he cannot turn around and say that ultimately the suit was dismissed and the doctrine of merger applies. He further contended that the order passed by this Court in the C.M.A. is a consent order, according to which the first respondent-plaintiff has to deposit a sum of Rs.1,50,000/- per annum till the disposal of the suit, but having obtained extension of time twice on 06-02-2009 and 01-05-2009, he raised the crop, harvested it and sold the same, but did not comply with the order passed by this Court. 5. The learned counsel has drawn our attention to a decision of the Supreme Court reported in PUNJAB NATIONAL BANK v. ASHWINI KUMAR TANEJA [1], wherein it was held that: “In a given case, even if ultimately the interim order is vacated or relief in the main proceeding is not granted to a party, the other side cannot take that as a ground for disobedience of any interim order passed by the court.” 6. The learned counsel also relied on UNION BANK OF INDIA v. SUBEDAR DEVASSY [2], wherein it was held: “If any party concerned is aggrieved by the order which in its opinion is wrong or against rules or its implementation is neither practicable nor feasible, it should always either approach the court that passed the order or invoke jurisdiction of the appellate court. Rightness or wrongness of the order cannot be urged in contempt proceedings. Right or wrong, the order has to be obeyed. Flouting an order of the court would render the party liable for contempt.” 7. To rebut the said contentions, the learned counsel Sri P. Venugopal appearing for the respondents contended that since the suit filed by the first respondent-plaintiff stood dismissed, the doctrine of merger applies and there is no willful or deliberate disobedience of the order passed by this Court and the contempt proceedings cannot be initiated. In support of his contention, he has relied upon B.S.N. JOSHI & SONS LTD v. AJOY MEHTA [3], wherein it was held that: “The alleged contemnors, therefore, in our opinion, did not read the directions of the Court in their proper perspective. We say so: (i) Because they could not have considered the directions contained in the interim order passed by this Court. The interim order merged into the final order. In any event, even the said interim order was subject to the decision of the Court and, thus, we fail to understand as to how the interim order was found to be continuing despite passing of the final order.” 8. The learned counsel for the respondents has also drawn our attention to the decisions in BIMLENDU KUMAR CHATTERJEE v. DIPA CHATTERJEE[4] and PREM CHANDRA AGARWAL v. U.P. FINANCIAL CORPN [5], which deal with the doctrine of merger, wherein it was held that once a final order is passed, all the earlier interim orders merge into the final order, and the interim orders cease to exist. 9. In view of the rival contentions, the point that arises for consideration is, whether, in the facts and circumstances of the case, there is any actionable willful disobedience by the respondent of the order dated 01-04-2008 passed by this Court in C.M.A.No.922 of 2007? 10. The order, dated 01-04-2008 is a consent order, wherein on instructions of his client, the learned counsel for the respondents has agreed to deposit an amount of Rs.1,50,000/- per annum, to which the learned counsel for the petitioner reported no objection. Accordingly, this Court set aside the order in the I.A. which is impugned in the C.M.A., and permitted the first respondent-plaintiff to take charge of the suit schedule property item Nos.1 to 14 and to manage the property subject to depositing a sum of Rs.1,50,000/- per annum to the credit of the suit, till its disposal. The first respondent- plaintiff, having received the benefit and advantage of the order, raised crops, harvested the same and sold it. 11. In the decision in AJOY MEHTA’s case (3 supra) cited by the learned counsel for the respondents, the direction given by the Court was not properly understood by the parties. But, in this case, it is not the case of the first respondent-plaintiff that he has not understood the order properly. Therefore, the above decision cannot be made applicable to facts of this case. 12. The first respondent-plaintiff, having got the time extended twice to comply with the order, did not care to deposit the amount, and ultimately disobeyed the order passed by this Court. As the order was a consent order, the first respondent-plaintiff cannot turn around and say that there is no willful disobedience. Even after understanding the repercussions of the order, he has not deposited the amount. 13. In the above circumstances, it is very clear that the first respondent-plaintiff, having got the advantage and benefit of the consent order, turned around on the ground that the doctrine of merger applies, which is not tenable, and thus, he flouted the order of this Court. 14. In view of the above circumstances, we hereby direct the first respondent-plaintiff to pay the amount of Rs.3,00,000/- within a period of six weeks from the date of receipt of a copy of this order and in case of failure, he shall be sent to civil prison for a period of three weeks. 15. The Contempt Case is, accordingly, ordered. ____________________ GHULAM MOHAMMED, J ___________________ P. SWAROOP REDDY, J Date: 09-11-2010 YCR [1] (2004) 7 SCC 265 [2] AIR 2006 SC 909 [3] (2009) 3 SCC 458 [4] (2001) 8 SCC 5 [5] (2009) 11 SCC 479