Telangana High Court
Puruhuta Agrawal, vs Anuraag Agrawal And Another on 8 January, 2024
THE HONOURABLE SMT. JUSTICE M.G.PRIYADARSINI
Civil Revision Petition No.153 OF 2019
ORDER:
Aggrieved by the docket order dated 26.12.2018
(hereinafter will be referred as 'impugned order') in I.A.No.1557
of 2018 in F.C.O.P.No.871 of 2018 on the file of learned Judge,
Family Court, Secunderabad, the respondent No. 1 filed the
present Civil Revision Petitions to set aside the impugned order.
2. For the sake of convenience, hereinafter, the parties will
be referred as per their array before the learned Judge, Family
Court, Secunderabad.
3. The brief facts of the case as can be seen from the record
available before this Court are that the petitioner by name
Anuraag Agrwal filed FCOP No.871 of 2018 against his wife by
name Puruhuta Agrawal and M/s. Indian Bank to declare him
as sole and exclusive authority to operate the bank locker
Nos.35 and 517 of respondent No.2 bank and directing
respondent No.2 to delete the name of respondent No.1 from the
list of joint hirers of locker Nos.35 and 517 and also for
consequential relief to grant perpetual injunction restraining
respondent No.1 from operating the bank locker Nos.35 and
517. Along with the said OP, the petitioner has also filed
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I.A.No.1557 of 2018 under Order XXXIX Rules 1 and 2 read
with Section 7 of the Family Courts Act seeking temporary
injunction restraining respondent No.1 from operating the said
bank locker Nos.35 and 517 pending disposal of the OP. The
respondent No.1 filed detailed counter with a prayer to dismiss
the petition. On considering the rival contentions, the learned
Judge, Family Court, Secunderabad directed both the parties to
maintain status quo ante and directed the bank manager not to
allow both the parties to operate the bank locker Nos.35 and
517 until further orders of the Court. Aggrieved by the same,
the respondent No.1 has preferred the present Civil Revision
Petition to set aside the impugned order.
4. Heard both sides and perused the record.
5. The brief facts, which lead the petitioner to file
I.A.No.1557 of 2018 under Order XXXIX Rules 1 and 2 read
with Section 7 of the Family Courts Act are that the petitioner
got married to respondent No.1 on 10.02.2004 and out of their
wedlock they were blessed with a baby girl on 05.10.2005. The
petitioner is alleged to have been suffering from bipolar disease
(experiencing severe and excessive manic depression and losing
ability of reasoning and unable to understand the consequences
of his conduct) and in view of acute matrimonial disturbances,
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the petitioner filed divorce petition before the Family Court at
Nagpur on 26.02.2013 and subsequently in view of the orders of
the Honourable Supreme Court in Tr. Petition (C) No.743 of
2013 the said case was transferred to Family Court, Chaibasa,
Jharkhand State with a direction to dispose of the same within
90 days. Accordingly, the said divorce petition was dismissed
vide judgment dated 12.06.2015. Aggrieved by the same, the
petitioner filed First Appeal No.172 of 2015, which was
dismissed for default on 20.08.2018. The petitioner and
respondent No.1 have opened bank locker Nos.35 and 517 with
respondent No.2 bank under joint application by executing a
locker rent agreement. It is the contention of the petitioner that
on 26.01.2015 the respondent No.1 had dialed 100 and tried to
get the petitioner arrested and then issued email dated
27.01.2015 to respondent No.2 requesting to stop the petitioner
from operating the said lockers in her absence. On 30.01.2015
the respondent No.1 and her father Mr.Shyam Sundar Lodha
have fraudulently obtained primary key of bank lockers from
the petitioner by mincing words and cheated the petitioner. It is
the contention of the petitioner that respondent No.1 being the
wife of the petitioner was aware that during the phases of manic
depression it is easy to control working of petitioner's brain and
thus, made the petitioner to execute letter dated 30.01.2015 in
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her favour. When the said letter was executed, the petitioner
alleged to have not been in a mental position to express his
understanding of the said document, as such, the said letter is
not binding on him. The valuable movables lying in the
disputed bank locker Nos.35 and 517 are owned by the
petitioner and his parents having lawful ownership, thus, at any
stretch of imagination, the respondent No.1 cannot be allowed
to operate and usurp the valuables lying in it. It is further
contention of the petitioner that respondent No.2 is not
supposed to allow either of them to operate the said bank locker
Nos.35 and 517 as they have given contrary instructions against
each other. Since 2015, the respondent No.2 bank restricted
the operation of bank lockers but after lapse of 3 years,
suddenly the respondent No.1 filed W.P.No.39030 of 2018
seeking exclusive rights to operate bank lockers without
petitioner's involvement. The petitioner was regularly paying
the locker rents but respondent No.1 taking undue advantage of
the letter dated 30.01.2015, which was executed by the
petitioner under fear, coercion and influence of bipolar disorder,
the same is not legally binding on the petitioner.
6. On the other hand, the brief averments of the counter
affidavit filed by the respondent No.1 are that the contents of
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the locker are her "stridhana" and the petitioner cannot lay any
claim in that respect. The respondent No.1 was constrained to
call police on 26.01.2015 as the petitioner is one of his violent
bout had locked the minor daughter inside the room and she
was crying being helpless. So far as the email dated 27.01.2015
is concerned, the respondent No.1 was constrained to write the
same as the petitioner threatened to remove all the stridhana
from the locker unilaterally. The petitioner having realized his
mistake gave letter dated 30.01.2015 in his own hand writing to
the Manager of the bank personally, as such, the petitioner was
in his full senses.
7. Though several contentions were raised by both the
parties with regard to matrimonial disputes between the parties,
the crux of the issues is whether the petitioner and respondent
No.1, who are joint hirers of locker Nos.35 and 517, can operate
the said lockers during the pendency of the main OP. As seen
from the rival contentions, the relationship between the
petitioner and the respondent No.1 has been strained and
divorce petition filed by the petitioner was dismissed and the
subsequent appeal was also dismissed. Whether the articles
stored in the two lockers belongs to the petitioner and his
parents or the stridhana of the respondent No.1, whether the
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petitioner has executed letter dated 30.01.2015 out of his
conscious mind or not, are the questions that can only be
decided after full-fledged enquiry but not prematurely. Mere
filing of W.P. No.39030 of 2018 by the respondent No.1 is not a
ground precluding the trial Court to pass ex parte ad interim
order, more particularly, when the learned counsel for the
petitioner has contended that no fruitful, enforceable or
injunctive orders were granted by the High Court in
W.P.No.39030 of 2018.
8. It is the contention of the learned counsel for the revision
petitioner/respondent No.1 that interim injunction restraining
the petitioner from operating the bank lockers would virtually
amount to granting the main prayer in the OP. It is to be seen
that the impugned order is only an ad interim ex parte interim
order passed in an interlocutory application that would subsist
until further orders of the trial Court. Moreover, the impugned
order not only restrained the respondent No.1 but also the
petitioner from operating the locker with an intention of
avoiding multiplicity of proceedings. In these circumstances, it
cannot be said that passing of impugned order amounts to
granting the main prayer in the OP. Though the petitioner as
well as respondent No.1 contended that the items in both the
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lockers belongs to either of them exclusively, no explanation is
offered by either of the parties as to what was the necessity for
them to open joint lockers when the items in the lockers are
exclusively belongs to either of the parties.
9. In view of the above discussion, this Court is of the
considered view that there is no infirmity or error apparent on
the face of record in the impugned order, more particularly,
when the scope of revision under Article 227 of the Constitution
of India to interfere with the findings of the trial Court is very
limited to a supervisory role and can certainly not be the resort
to correct every erroneous order. As seen from the grounds of
revision, the revision petitioner failed to bring out any of the
grounds showing that there is an error apparent on the face of
the record to set aside the impugned order. Therefore, there are
no merits in the Civil Revision Petition and thereby it is liable to
be dismissed.
10. Accordingly, the Civil Revision Petition is dismissed.
There shall be no order as to costs.
Pending Miscellaneous applications, if any, shall stand
closed.
_______________________________
JUSTICE M.G.PRIYADARSINI
Date: 08.01.2024
AS
