Supreme Court: The 3-judge bench Ashok Bhushan, R. Subhash Reddy and MR Shah has reiterated that when the main judgment of the High Court has not been challenged, no relief can be granted by this Court in the special leave petition filed against order rejecting review application to review the main judgment of the High Court.
The Court was hearing a case relating to suspension of an employee of a cooperative bank after conduct of disciplinary authority.
- The Cooperative Tribunal later imposed a punishment of compulsory retirement on the petitioner.
- This order was challenged before the High Court but the same was dismissed.
- Hence, the petitioner filed an SLP before the Supreme Court which was also dismissed in 2015.
- A review petition was filed which was also dismissed in 2016.
- A curative petition was also dismissed in 2016.
- Then the review petition was again filed which was dismissed by the High Court vide its judgment dated 06.02.2020. Hence, this SLP.
The Court noticed that in Bussa Overseas and Properties Private Limited v. Union of India, (2016) 4 SCC 696 has held that principle of not entertaining special leave petition against an order rejecting the review petition when main judgment is not under challenge has become a precedential principle
Applying the same principle to the present case, the Court said that against the main judgment the SLP having been dismissed earlier the same having become final between the parties cannot be allowed to be affected at the instance of petitioner.
“ When the main judgment of the High Court cannot be effected in any manner, no relief can be granted by this Court in the special leave petition filed against order rejecting review application to review the main judgment of the High Court. This Court does not entertain a special leave petition in which no relief can be granted.”
[T.K. David v. Kuruppampady Service Co-operative Bank Ltd., 2020 SCC OnLine SC 800, decided on 05.10.2020]