IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA CWJC No.12257 of 2010 SATYENDRA NARAYAN SINGH (ADVOCATE), VICE PRESIDENT, LAWYER'S ASSOCIATION, PATNA HIGH COURT S/O SRI BHARAT PRASAD SINGH R/O MOHALLA- INDRAPURI, ROAD NO. 5 'B', P.S.- PATLIPUTRA, DISTT.- PATNA. ……….Petitioner. Versus 1. THE CHAIRMAN, STATE BANK OF INDIA, CORPORATE CENTRE, MADAM CAMA ROAD, MUMBAI-400021 2. THE PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICER, STATE BANK OF INDIA CORPORATE CENTRE, MADAM CAM ROAD, MUMBAI-400021 3. THE CHIEF GENERAL MANAGER, STATE BANK OF INDIA LOCAL HEAD OFFICE, WEST GANDHI MAIDAN, PATNA 4. THE PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICER, STATE BANK OF INDIA WEST GANDHI MAIDAN, PATNA-800001 5. CHAIRMAN, INSURANCE REGULATORY AND DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY 3RD FLOOR, PARISRAMA BHAWAN BAGH, HYDERABAD-500004 6. THE UNION OF INDIA THROUGH THE SECRETARY, FINANCE MINISTRY OF FINANCE, GOVERNMENT OF INDIA, SOUTH BLOCK, NEW DELHI. 7. THE REGIONAL DIRECTOR, R.B.I., GANDHI MAIDAN, PATNA. …………Respondents. ----------- For the petitioner : Mr. Aditya Narayan Singh, Advocate. For the R.B.I. : Mr. Kaushal Kumar Jha, Advocate. For the S.B.I. : Mr. Kaushlendra Kumar Sinha, Advocate For the IRDA : Mr. Arun Kumar, Advocate ----------- 11 04.03.2011 On hearing the parties and going through the materials available on record including the counter affidavit filed on behalf of respondent no. 5, this Court is compelled to revert to the basic 2 issue whether this writ petition raises a matter which should be pursued by way of public interest litigation or not. 2. The petitioner is an advocate of this Court and he has preferred this writ petition by way of public interest litigation for the purposes mentioned in paragraph 1 and paragraph 8 which also contains two prayers described as (a) and (b). Both the paragraphs i.e. paragraph 1 and paragraph 8 are extracted herein below: “1. That this PIL is preferred under the original jurisdiction of this Honourable Court under Art. 226 of the Constitution of India to draw the kind attention of this Hon’ble Court to the oppressive and capricious acts of public officers of Insurance Companies (both private and public) as also the Banks (both private and public) as the unholy nexus between the two has resulted in harassment and deprivation of common man and aggrandizement of the public officers as they siphon off significant part of commission of premium on insurance business booked and collected at the cost of Company they seem to be serving. 8. That the petitioner has not moved earlier before this Hon’ble Court for the relief prayed for in the present writ application. It is therefore, prayed that your 3 lordships may graciously be pleased to admit this application, issue notices to the respondents asking them to show cause as to why an appropriate writ and direction not be issued to them on the following:- (a) to furnish full data as requested and discussed in para 6 and its sub paras to this petitioner for the legal scrutiny/audit in the general public interest and after such audit/fact finding exercise a report to be submitted before your lordships for laying down direction and guidelines for the Banking, Insurance Companies as well as its regulator. Since practice adopted by the respondents is of criminal nature at a very big/large scale the responsibilities of offence alleged, if confirmed through proposed scrutiny, be fixed on the person(s) involved in the scam; (b) to make RTI application in all cases where a company is collecting money from public and is duty bound to extend service should not be allowed to duck behind technicalities of law; ” 3. We find that the petitioner wants this court to go into propriety of creation of insurance companies by various banks and order for disclosure of financial principles and policies of such companies. The issue being raised is that 4 the insurance companies created by the banks are doing wrong business to the detriment of the consumers and the banks are helping such insurance companies by forcing its clients to subscribe to insurance policies. The materials available on record by way of reply by the State Bank of India show that the basic facts are under serious dispute. We find that the issues raised in this writ petition are clearly adversarial in nature and are not of a kind which should be espoused by this Court in public interest. 4. In view of aforesaid conclusions this writ petition is dismissed. PN ( Shiva Kirti Singh, J) ( Gopal Prasad, J)