Delhi High Court: In a case wherein the question regarding jurisdiction arose before the Court, Prateek Jalan. J*, opined that the letter dated 10-05-2016 from Delhi, only constituted a slender part of the cause of action and could not be the basis to determine that whether this Court could entertain the petition. The Court opined that the present case fell within the narrow category of cases where it was appropriate to invoke the doctrine of forum conveniens and refused to exercise the jurisdiction.
Background
In the instant case, the petitioner, NBCC (India) Limited was a Public Sector Undertaking, whose head office was situated in New Delhi. On 09-03-2015, the petitioner from his Gurugram office, applied for approval of electrical load and scheme to Respondent 1, Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam, a power distribution utility company owned by Government of Haryana. Further, a letter dated 10-05-2016, addressed by the Chief Engineer of Respondent 1 from his Delhi office to the Superintending Engineer, (OP) Circle in Gurugram, sanction was accorded to the petitioner’s project.
Respondent 3, a society under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 also had a housing project situated proximately to the petitioner’s project in Gurugram. The petitioner, Respondent 3 and other developers with the project in the same area entered into arrangements for sharing of infrastructure for electrification of their projects, which included Memorandum of Understanding dated 05-11-2020 and a Gift deed dated 10-08-2021 executed by Respondent 3 in favour of Respondent 1.
The petitioner in its writ petition had challenged a communication dated 01-06-2022 addressed by Respondent 2, Executive Engineer (OP) Division of Respondent 1, to Respondent 3. As per the letter dated 01-06-2022, Respondent 1 observed that the petitioner’s project was located at a distance of 3.5 kms from switching station created by Respondent 3, and decided that formation of a group between the petitioner and Respondent 3 for sharing the switching station was not technically feasible.
Thereafter, the petitioner addressed a representation dated 06-06-2022 to the Chief Engineer of Respondent 1 at Gurugram. Further, another letter dated 21-09-2022 from Respondent 1 to the petitioner (both at Gurugram) reiterated that the petitioner’s proposal to share the switching station with Respondent 3 was not technically feasible. However, by a letter dated 27-10-2022 addressed to Respondent 1 in Gurugram, the petitioner from its Gurugram office reiterated its request for permission to share the feeder station with Respondent 3.
Thus, the petitioner filed a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution seeking to quash the letter dated 01-06-2022 and issuing appropriate direction to Respondent 2 for switching station.
However, the question arose regarding jurisdiction of the present Court. The petitioner submitted that the present petition was maintainable before this Court, since Respondent 1 and 3 were situated in Delhi and the original sanction letter dated 10-05-2016 was granted to the petitioner by Respondent 1, situated in Delhi.
Analysis, Law, and Decision
The Court observed that the jurisdiction of the High Court to issue writs to any person or authority within its territorial jurisdiction came from Article 226(1) of the Constitution and Article 226(2) of the Constitution extended the High Court’s jurisdiction to Government, authorities or persons seated outside its jurisdiction if the cause of action, wholly or in part, arose within the jurisdiction of the High Court.
Further the Court referred to Kusum Ingots and Alloys Ltd. v. Union of India, (2004) 6 SCC 254 and Eastern Coalfields Ltd. v. Kalyan Banerjee, (2008) 3 SCC 456, wherein it was held that similar to Section 20(c) of Civil Procedure Code, 1908, ‘cause of action’ for Article 226(2) of the Constitution constituted the bundle of facts which were required to be proved in order for the writ to be issued.
The Court opined that in the present case, the writ petition seeking to quash the letter dated 01-06-2022 and issuance of directions to Respondent 2, who is located in Gurugram was outside the jurisdiction of the present Court and therefore, Article 226(1) of the Constitution had no application.
However, the Court noted that the petitioner’s grievance related to reversal of the stand taken by Respondent 1 in its communication dated 10-05-2016, issued from New Delhi, this Court noted that part of the cause of action asserted by the petitioner arose within the jurisdiction of the present Court.
The Court further examined the doctrine of forum conveniens and opined that it provided a key exception to the exercise of jurisdiction and essentially mandated that a High Court would not exercise jurisdiction if the proceedings were most intimately connected with another High Court.
The Court referred to Kusum Ingots and Alloys Ltd. v. Union of India, (2004) 6 SCC 254, State of Goa v. Summit Online Trade Solutions (P) Ltd. (2023) 7 SCC 791, Sterling Agro Industries v. Union of India 2011 SCC OnLine Del 3162, Maharashtra Chess Assn. v. Union of India (2020) 13 SCC 285 and Larsen & Toubro Ltd. v. Punjab National Bank 2021 SCC OnLine Del 3827 and opined that applying these decisions in the present case, the cause of action pleaded by the petitioner was against a communication issued in Gurugram. The petitioner’s grievance was entirely in respect of electrification of its project in Gurugram and thus, the case was connected most intimately with the State of Haryana.
The Court opined that the letter dated 10-05-2016 from Delhi, could constitute only a slender part of the cause of action and could not be determinative of the question as to whether this Court ought to entertain the petition. Thus, the Court opined that the present case fell within the narrow category of cases where it was appropriate to invoke the doctrine of forum conveniens and declined to exercise the jurisdiction.
Accordingly, the Court dismissed the writ petition with liberty to the petitioner to approach the appropriate Court on the same cause of action.
[NBCC (India) Ltd. v. Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 6118, decided on 27-09-2023]
*Judgment authored by- Justice Prateek Jalan
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For the Petitioner: Arvind Minocha, Senior Advocate with Rajnish Kr. Jha, Aditi Yaduvanshi, Advocate with Vikas Kumar, Manager (Law);
For the Respondents: Samir Malik, Akash Lamba, Nikita Chokse, Krishan Kumar, Advocates; A.K. Tiwari, Rahul Burman and Yosha Dutt, Advocates
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