'Ghost litigant' case: SC asks Bar Council of India to investigate matter pertaining to fake compromise

The mystery of the "ghost litigant" in Supreme Court continues as all lawyers involved in the case refuse involvement. The apex court has now ordered an inquiry by the Bar Council of India into the controversy and said that it would consider a police investigation after getting BCI's report, TOI reported.

A bench of Justices P S Narasimha and Atul S Chandurkar has granted eight weeks to the BCI to investigate the controversy and file a report.

The bench also accepted the plea of Supreme Court Advocates On Record Association president Vipin Nair who said that BCI should first hold an inquiry on the alleged role of lawyers only then should the police be involved if some outsider is found to be involved.

What is the 'ghost litigant' case?

The case pertains to a litigant who managed to get a favourable order from the SC after a 'ghost' opponent propped up in court proceedings and told the court that he had compromised with the petitioner in a land dispute. This had become the basis for the SC to quash orders passed by a Muzaffarpur trial court and Patna HC against the litigant.

After five month, the real opponent appeared and told the top court that he had neither compromised with the petitioner nor engaged any lawyer to represent him before the court. Now, both parties are blaming each other for playing with the court and both of them pressed for police investigation.

The SC has already recalled its order that was passed on the basis of the alleged fake compromise.

Advocate Gyanant Singh, appearing for the aggrieved party, told the court that the compromise agreement was fake and his client had not signed the compromise deed and all the documents filed by the opposite party in the case are suspect, adding that a police investigation should be ordered.

Meanwhile, senior advocate Chinmoy Pradeep Sharma, appearing for the opposite party who was the beneficiary of apex court's order which now stands withdrawn, argued that the agreement was valid as there were signatures of both parties and insisted that FIR should be lodged in the case.

Singh, however, said that his client, who is now in his 90s, went unrepresented in the hearing and there was no question of his agreeing to compromise which was against his interest,

The names of four lawyers were mentioned in the order out of which three are known names in the field of litigation but no one had heard of the fourth advocate.

It came to light that the lawyer who is advocate-on-record (AoR) and allegedly represented the fake party did not practice law any more and he and his daughter, whose name was also there, were not even aware of the case.

The court, thereafter, directed the third lawyer to appear before it.

In a fresh twist to the case, the AoR filed an affidavit in the court alleging that a third lawyer who was working from his chamber was involved in the case and misused his name to get the documents filed in the court.

(With TOI inputs)