Appellate Division
Deputy Commissioner, Chittagong v Interbulk Overseas SA Bangladesh Limited and another
Civil Appeal 171/2015 · Appeals allowed; High Court judgment struck down · Decided 21 May 2025
Four companies holding land in Chittagong by settlement, lease or ownership challenged by writ petitions the proceedings in L.A. Case No. 1/2010-2011 under the Acquisition and Requisition of Immovable Property Ordinance, 1982 and a Ministry of Land memo dated 23.11.2010 approving acquisition and transfer of land for a coal-based power plant jetty and cold storage yard. They relied on a note dated 14.11.2010 by which the Prime Minister had allegedly sent back the summary and directed a fresh one. The High Court Division made the Rules absolute, holding the memo mala fide and the whole proceeding a nullity. The Deputy Commissioner appealed. Hearing the four appeals together, the Appellate Division accepted the contention that no such note existed in the original file, which the writ petitioners did not controvert in their concise statements. It found the note fictitious, noted that a confidential summary had been used without disclosing its source, and deprecated the Deputy Commissioner's negligent stance below. Holding the judgment vitiated by fraud, it allowed the appeals.
- Whether the High Court Division's judgment, founded on a note purportedly recording the Prime Minister's direction to submit a fresh summary, could stand once that note was shown not to exist.
- Whether writ petitioners who approach the court with unclean hands are entitled to relief under Article 102.
- A litigant must approach the court with clean hands; litigants who, with intent to deceive and mislead the court, proceed without full disclosure of facts are not entitled to be heard on merit or to any relief, interim or final (Kishore Samrite v State of U.P.).
- The writ petitioners quoted a confidential summary prepared for the Prime Minister without disclosing how they obtained it, and using it in a court proceeding without due authorisation is a punishable offence under the Official Secret Act, 1923.
- As the writ petitioners could not controvert the assertion that the note did not exist, the summary showing the Prime Minister's endorsement dated 14.11.2010 was found to be fictitious and non-existent.
- The Deputy Commissioner's stand in the High Court Division, merely stating that the note was a matter of record, was negligent, unacceptable and strongly deprecated.
- Fraud unravels everything; since the High Court Division relied on the fictitious note in declaring the acquisition proceedings and the memo unlawful, its judgment was vitiated by fraud and struck down.
Resultantly, the entire judgment and order dated 13.02.2014 by the High Court Division is vitiated with fraud and the same is, accordingly, struck down.
