Orissa HC penalises company secretary of ₹5L for frivolous plea

Cuttack: The Orissa High Court on Wednesday imposed a fine of Rs 5 lakh on Bhagyadhar Behera, a 64-year-old Bhubaneswar-based company secretary for filing a “frivolous and vexatious” plea and “abusing the process of court.”
The two-judge bench of Chief Justice Charadhari Sharan Singh and Justice M S Raman said the exemplary cost is being imposed to discourage filing of such petitions.
The bench directed Behera to deposit the amount in the High Court Bar Association Advocates’ Welfare Fund within three weeks.
According to the order, Behera had in his petition sought direction to the Election Commission of India (ECI) to complete inquiry within a stipulated time on his complaint alleging that Ashwini Vaishnaw (currently Railway Minister) had made false declaration while filing nominations for elections to the Rajya Sabha in 2019.Vaishnaw was elected to the Rajya Sabha on a BJP ticket from Odisha in 2019. He was re-elected from Odisha in 2024. Behera filed the petition through advocate Sidharth Prasad Das a day after the ensuing elections in Odisha were notified on March 18. The Bench said: “After having carefully perused the pleadings in the writ petition, we are of the definite view that the filing of the writ petition is total abuse of the process of the court.