Madras High Court: The Division Bench of K. Kalyanasundaram and R. Hemalatha, JJ., expressed that, the Government advocate being the representative of the Government has to act in an honest manner. If he/she goes around with the intention to make money at the cost of justice, only chaos will prevail.
Petitioner sought for quashing the impugned order in which her services as Special Public Prosecutor was terminated with immediate effect.
According to the petitioner, she was sincere and hardworking and out of 439 cases disposed, she was instrumental in ensuring conviction and severe punishments in 16 cases which was widely appreciated by the Police, Bench and Bar. However, according to her an anonymous complaint against her casting aspersions on her honesty and integrity was taken cognizance by the then-District Collector (2nd respondent).
On the report of the Superintendent of Police (3rd respondent) and the District Collectors’ findings, the State Government (1st respondent) terminated the services of petitioner, which according to the petitioner was unjust and unreasonable.
High Court’s Findings
Bench noted that there were allegations of corruption made against the petitioner which were true and that she had also misused her position by extracting menial work from the police constables on Court duty. Earlier, a ‘road roko’ agitation by the Advocates in order to remove the petitioner from her post also occurred.
It was further found that in a POCSO case, the petitioner had received illegal gratification from the accused and ensured their acquittal on flimsy grounds was referred to by the District Collector.
Amongst a few letters against the petitioner, in one of the letters, there was mention of the corrupt practices of the petitioner and how she had tried to convince the victim and their parents in the POCSO case to compromise with the accused by receiving compensation.
A famous quote is “truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t going away.”
High Court stated that,
Every Advocate is a Court officer and part and parcel of the justice delivery system. The public reposes great faith in the judiciary but the judges have to rely on their pillars, the advocates.
Bench found from the records that the petitioner had been demanding bribes and acted like an extra-constitutional authority attempting to fix up compromises in serious cases of offence and this caused a serious dent in the justice delivery system.
Lastly, the Court found no violation of natural justice nor any fundamental rights.
Therefore, in view of the above, a petition was dismissed. [Dhanalakshmi v. State, 2022 SCC OnLine Mad 1275, decided on 22-3-2022]
Advocates before the Court:
For Appellant: Mr P. Subba Reddy
For Respondents: Mrs V.Y amuna Devi Special Government Pleader