PANAJI
"When confronted with a question of the inappropriateness of his petition, its tone and its language, he is by turns peevish and downright disrespectful.
"He tells us he will withdraw all of his several hundred petitions. If this is supposed to be some sort of threat, or meant to intimidate, it is an epic failure and if these are PILs, it says more about the bona fides of those PILs than he imagines," the division bench of Justices G S Patel and Nutan Sardesai observed.
"He is also mistaken if he believes that he can withdraw a PIL without our leave. If the cause be genuine, we will continue that PIL with him
or without him," the court noted.
"All before us are on exactly the same footing, none more, none less. From all who come to us with their petitions, we expect - no; we demand - above all civility in their arguments and their pleadings," the court said adding that if Shetye believes that in filing petitions he is offering some sort of favour to the court, the judicial system or society at large, then he is simply wrong.
"The sheer volumes of filings do not impress us. We will look to the cause, not the person who brings it, and we will look to it if it is addressed in a manner appropriate to a court of law.
"By this we mean not just this court, but every court throughout the land," the court noted.
The court seriously questioned the "probity and propriety in using inappropriate language, aggressive and entirely disrespectful, when addressing orders of tribunals and Courts" in this case an order of the principal bench of the NGT headed by former judge of the Supreme Court Swatanter Kumar.
"Statements of this stripe, and words of this kind, will not be tolerated at any time, and most emphatically not when directed against a tribunal or a court. That (Shetye) is in person is wholly immaterial," the court observed.
"The first petitioner (Shetye) forgets that he is addressing an institution, not a mob, and a court at that. There is no place here for rabble rousing or park corner soap box grandstanding. This has become a fashion.
"Every time any tribunal passes an order, and even though there are available recourse and remedies, the instant response is to file Writ Petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India and in that to jettison all considerations of restraint and dignity.
"If there is one thing a petition under Article 226 is not meant for it is to pillory tribunals and courts. Nor is it meant for publicity," the High Court observed while dismissing the petition.
