Case: Union Of India  Vs. Priyankan Sharan

5. In each case the appellant sought to invoke the bond agreement executed. The two respondents in Civil Appeal arising out of SLP (C) No. 580 of 2005 and the respondents in other Civil Appeal arising out of SLP (C) No. 25514/2004 had taken admission to the MBBS Degree Course of Armed Forces Medical College, Pune. At the time of admission they being minors their guardians had executed the bonds to the effect that after completion of MBBS course, the students in question shall serve the nation by working in the Armed Force for a specific period of time. Clause 4 of the agreement dealt with a situation when a cadet shall be declared to have become Non Service Liability (in short `NSL) in the event of any of the three categories. It is provided that in such event Clauses 5 and 6 will be applicable. However, he or she can be permitted at the discretion of DGAFMS to continue her studies on payment of normal tuition fee at the rate in force at the time but the students have to move out of the hostel premises. Clause 5 of the agreement states that in the event of a student being removed from the service liability for any reason, shall be liable to pay the amount calculated at a particular rate per annum from the date of admission to the College till the date of NSL subject to maximum together with interest on the said amount at rates in force then. Clause 6 provided that student who is removed from service liability under Clause 4(a) shall be required to pay in cash an amount calculated at the rate of rupees one and a half lakh per year or part thereof from the date of admission to the college till the date of becoming a NSL limited to maximum of seven and half lakh together with interest calculated on the same basis stated in Clause 5. This was the position in 1999. The High Court in each case observed that the candidate was suffering from ailment and was removed from service liability. After removal the present appellants tried to enforce the bonds on the purported ground of failure on the part of the cadet to serve the nation in accordance with the terms and conditions of the bond. In appeal relating to Kiran Kumar and Another, the High Court in the impugned judgment in paras 3 and 4 noted that in the earlier cases orders were passed that on payment of rupees one lakh when the bond amount was rupees three lakhs, there shall be total liquidation of liability on the bond.

Reasoning: 23. While interpreting a provision the Court only interprets the law and cannot legislate it. If a provision of law is misused and subjected to the abuse of process of law, it is for the legislature to amend, modify or repeal it, if deemed necessary. (See Commissioner of Sales Tax, M.P. v. Popular Trading Company, Ujjain (2000 (5) SCC 515 ). The legislative casus omissus cannot be supplied by judicial interpretative process.24. Two principles of construction - one relating to casus omissus and the other in regard to reading the statute as a whole - appear to be well settled. Under the first principle a casus omissus cannot be supplied by the Court except in the case of clear necessity and when reason for it is found in the four corners of the statute itself but at the same time a casus omissus should not be readily inferred and for that purpose all the parts of a statute or section must be construed together and every clause of a section should be construed with reference to the context and other clauses thereof so that the construction to be put on a particular provision makes a consistent enactment of the whole statute. This would be more so if literal construction of a particular clause leads to manifestly absurd or anomalous results which could not have been intended by the Legislature. "An intention to produce an unreasonable result", said Danackwerts, L.J. in Artemiou v. Procopiou (1966 1 QB 878), "is not to be imputed to a statute if there is some other construction available". Where to apply words literally would "defeat the obvious intention of the legislature and produce a wholly unreasonable result" we must "do some violence to the words" and so achieve that obvious intention and produce a rational construction. (Per Lord Reid in Luke v. IRC (1966 AC 557) where at p. 577 he also observed: "this is not a new problem, though our standard of drafting is such that it rarely emerges".25. It is then true that, "when the words of a law extend not to an inconvenience rarely happening, but due to those which often happen, it is good reason not to strain the words further than they reach, by saying it is casus omissus, and that the law intended quae frequentius accidunt." "But," on the other hand, "it is no reason, when the words of a law do enough extend to an inconvenience seldom happening, that they should not extend to it as well as if it happened more frequently, because it happens but seldom" (See Fenton v. Hampton 11 Moore, P.C. 345). A casus omissus ought not to be created by interpretation, save in some case of strong necessity. Where, however, a casus omissus does really occur, either through the inadvertence of the legislature, or on the principle quod semel aut bis existit proetereunt legislators, the rule is that the particular case, thus left unprovided for, must be disposed of according to the law as it existed before such statute - Casus omissus et oblivioni datus dispositioni communis juris relinquitur; "a casus omissus," observed Buller, J. in Jones v. Smart (1 T.R. 52), "can in no case be supplied by a court of law, for that would be to make laws."26. The golden rule for construing wills, statutes, and, in fact, all written instruments has been thus stated: "The grammatical and ordinary sense of the words is to be adhered to unless that would lead to some absurdity or some repugnance or inconsistency with the rest of the instrument, in which case the grammatical and ordinary sense of the words may be modified, so as to avoid that absurdity and inconsistency, but no further" (See Grey v. Pearson 6 H.L. Cas. 61). The latter part of this "golden rule" must, however, be applied with much caution. "if," remarked Jervis, C.J., "the precise words used are plain and unambiguous in our judgment, we are bound to construe them in their ordinary sense, even though it lead, in our view of the case, to an absurdity or manifest injustice. Words may be modified or varied where their import is doubtful or obscure. But we assume the functions of legislators when we depart from the ordinary meaning of the precise words used, merely because we see, or fancy we see, an absurdity or manifest injustice from an adherence to their literal meaning" (See Abley v. Dale 11, C.B. 378).27. At this juncture, it would be necessary to take note of a maxim "Ad ea quae frequentius accidunt jura adaptantur" (The laws are adapted to those cases which more frequently occur).28. The above position was highlighted in Maulavi Hussein Haji Abraham Umarji v. State of Gujarat (2004 (6) SCC 672 ).29. As noted above, Clause 4(a) is subject to Clause 6 and the proviso appended to Clause 4 is in the nature of exception. The High Courts view is a rational one on the facts of each case. These are not the cases where any interference is called for.