A Ludhiana-based fabric merchant, who entered India’s Supreme Court armed with a PIL document full of sophisticated legal terminology, failed to explain a single term in it, prompting Chief Justice Surya Kant to deliver one of the court’s most memorable rebukes in recent memory.
A petition that raised immediate red flags
A public interest litigation related to the PM Cares fund came up before a bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice R Mahadevan.
The language of the petition, full of constitutional principles and legal nomenclature, made the man who filed it uncomfortable from the start, the Bar and Bench said.
The petitioner, a hosiery merchant, who studied only up to 12th standard and had never before filed a petition in any High Court, appeared directly before the Supreme Court. Chief Justice Kant’s reply was ironic: “Bada bahaduri ka kaam kiya, seedha Ludhiana se chalke aagaye!” (Very brave of you to come straight from Ludhiana)
The judicial examination that revealed the petition
Suspecting that someone else had drafted the petition, Chief Justice Kant proposed an impromptu test. “Main apka ek exam karwaunga yaha if you manage to get atleast 30% in english exam i will believe this request is yours.
When asked to explain the phrase “Fiduciary Risk of Corporate Donors,” a term used prominently in the petition, the businessman was unable to offer any response. The Chief Justice spared no effort: “Sidhu sahab yeh toh aapne kagaz pe likh rakha hai, kisi vakil ne apko likh ke diya hai” (This was written and handed over to you by some lawyer).
AI tools, scribe and four jackets
The stunned petitioner offered a candid account of how the petition came about. He initially approached a scribe named Das in September, he said, and then wrote the lawsuit using three or four AI tools, insisting he did it himself because he didn’t have the funds to hire a lawyer.
The deal with the typist, he explained, was not settled in cash, but in kind: “Yes typist hai, unko 4 jackets gift kari thi, bohot ache hai woh, 1 ghante ka 1 hazaar mang rahe the” (the typist helped me; I gave him four jackets because I had no money, although he asked for them. ₹1000 per hour)
The bench directed Das to appear before it.
The Supreme Court dismissed the PIL with a stern warning
The Supreme Court dismissed the petition saying in its order that the petitioner “filed the petition without any sense of responsibility” and “indulged in vague, wild, frivolous and scandalous allegations”.
The court clearly stated that “the tone and manner, the expressions, the terminology and the so-called ‘constitutional principle’ cannot be the work of the petitioner”, although it declined to make a broader inquiry as to who was ultimately behind the submission.
Chief Justice Kant’s parting words carried the flavor of the entire exchange: “Go to Ludhiana mein 2-3 and sell sweaters, jin ka kaam hai aisi petition file karna, woh nuksaan kardengay aur apka, costs lagwa ke” (Go back to your business in Ludhiana; those who use you to file such motions will eventually be charged costs
