CIVIL REVISION NO.8153 OF 2010 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH CIVIL REVISION NO.8153 OF 2010 DATE OF DECISION: DECEMBER 15, 2010 Ram Bhawan Gupta .... Petitioner VERSUS Haryana Urban Development Authority & another .... Respondents CORAM :- HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE L. N. MITTAL. PRESENT: Mr. P. P. S. Doabia, Advocate for the petitioner. * * * * L.N. MITTAL, J. (ORAL) Ram Bhawan Gupta, whose petition filed against respondents Haryana Urban Development Authority (in short HUDA) through its Administrator and HUDA through its Estate Officer, for taking action against them under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 (in short 'the Act') has been dismissed by the trial court i.e. Learned Additional Civil Judge (Senior Division), Faridabad vide impugned judgment dated 15.10.2010, has approached this Court by way of instant civil revision under Article 227 of the Constitution of India to challenge aforesaid judgment of the trial court. The petitioner alleged in his contempt petition that he had filed suit No.79 of 29.01.1992 in which Deputy District Attorney representing the respondents made statement in court on 15.03.1993 that the petitioner would not be dispossessed from the suit property forcibly by the respondents. However, in violation of the said undertaking, officials of respondents with police help demolished Jhuggis (huts) of the petitioner existing in the suit property with bulldozers on 17.10.2000 and thus respondents committed contempt of court. Respondents denied the allegations made in the contempt petition. CIVIL REVISION NO.8153 OF 2010 -2- It was alleged that respondents did not carry out any demolition in the suit property. It was pleaded that Jhuggis are in existence in the suit property and petitioner is in occupation thereof and is also running a ration depot there. Respondents thus pleaded that they have not violated any order of the Court. Learned trial court after framing issues and recording evidence has dismissed the contempt petition filed by the petitioner vide impugned judgment dated 15.10.2010. Feeling aggrieved, petitioner has filed the instant revision petition. I have heard learned counsel for the petitioner and perused the case file. Learned counsel for the petitioner contended that officials of the respondents demolished the construction of the petitioner existing in the suit property and thereby violated the undertaking given in the trial court and it amounts to contempt of court. The contention cannot be accepted. Respondents in their reply specifically pleaded that they had not carried out any demolition in the suit property. The petitioner has failed to prove that the respondents carried out any demolition in the suit property. There is only self- serving, bald and oral statement of the petitioner in this regard. However, said statement without any corroborating evidence is not sufficient to prove the aforesaid version of the petitioner. On the contrary, even said statement of the petitioner stands rebutted by sworn testimony of respondents' official Raj Pal, Junior Engineer who stated that no demolition was carried out in the suit property by the respondents. Consequently, the finding of the trial court in this regard that the petitioner has failed to prove that respondents made any demolition in the suit property does not suffer from any illegality or jurisdictional error warranting interference in revision petition. In addition to the aforesaid, the petitioner filed the contempt CIVIL REVISION NO.8153 OF 2010 -3- petition against HUDA through its Administrator and HUDA through its Estate Officer without naming any officer or official of HUDA as contemner. Contempt petition had to be filed against concerned officials by name who allegedly violated the undertaking given in the court. The contempt petition cannot be filed against HUDA through Administrator or through Estate Officer without naming any individual at all. Even in the evidence, the petitioner could not name any person who allegedly carried out the alleged demolition. For this reason as well, the contempt petition moved by the petitioner is not maintainable. It is also worth mentioning that alleged demolition was carried out on 17.10.2000 i.e. more than 10 years ago. Section 20 of the Act stipulates that no court shall initiate any proceedings of contempt either on its own motion or otherwise after the expiry of a period of one year from the date on which the contempt is alleged to have been committed. Till now, no proceedings of contempt have been initiated as no reference has been made to this court by the trial court nor this court has initiated proceedings of contempt either on its own motion or otherwise. More than ten years have already lapsed since the alleged contempt was committed. Consequently, in view of mandatory provision of Section 20 of the Act, proceedings of alleged contempt cannot be initiated at this highly belated stage. For the reasons aforesaid, I find no merit in the instant revision petition which is accordingly dismissed in limine. (L. N. MITTAL) JUDGE December 10, 2010 'raj'