The judgment emphasizes the importance of upholding Court orders and the rule of law, condemning the violation of a status quo order and the trial Court's failure to address the violation.

1. Heard.

2. The State has appeared and filed counter-affidavit. With consent of the parties this application is heard and is being disposed of at the stage of admission itself.

3. The present application has been filed by the petitioners who are plaintiffs in the Court below, being aggrieved by the order dated 18.8.2005 by which the trial Court has rejected the application dated 17.5.2005 filed by the plaintiffs in the Court below for a direction to the respondents to restore status-quo ante.

4. It appears that in 1996 apprehending forceful and unlawful demolition of their small shops along road flanks the plaintiffs had filed the present suit. They had made a prayer for an injunction in terms of Order 39, Rules 1 and 2 to restrain the opposite party Corporation and the State from taking any action to remove them except in accordance with law. As no precipilative action was taken the injunction application remained pending. On 11.5.2006 the State officials forcefully demolished certain such premises along the Company Bagh Road even though their injunction was also pending in the same suit. Apprehending that shops at Old Bus Stand Road would meet with similar fate on 12.5.2005 the injunction application filed earlier was moved clearly stating that action had been taken on 11.5.2005 against shopkeepers of Company Bagh Road. The application being urgent was taken up by the trial Court on 12.5.2006 and the defendants were represented by the learned Government Pleader. The Court passed an order of status-quo in presence of the learned Government Pleader.

5. It is then stated that the Government Pleader informed the Collector and the Sub-divisional Officer of the order of the statusquo. The plaintiff-petitioners also met the Collector and the Sub-divisional Officer. It is then stated that notwithstanding the said order of the trial Court and the order having been communicated to the Officer concerned in total disregard thereof the shops situated at the Old Bus Stand road were unauthorisedly, illegally and forcefully demolished and the plaintiff-petitioners were evicted. On 16.5.2005, with Second Saturday and Sunday intervening, an application was filed giving detailed sequence of events and specific averments as regards communication of order and of demolition etc. The State filed a rejoinder. After hearing the parties the impugned order was passed. The prayer of the petitioners as made in their application dated 18.5.2005 for restoring status quo ante, meaning thereby status quo as on the date when the Court passed status quo order on 12.5.2005, was rejected not because of any dispute nor that the possession of the plaintiff-petitioners was not accepted but merely on the ground that it would be considered along with the merits of the case. The grievance of the plaintiffs petitioners are that such an order is wholly without jurisdiction and caused serious prejudice to the petitioner apart from affecting the majesty and dignity of the Court itself.

6. In the aforesaid circumstances it is first to be determined as to what actually happened. It is not disputed that on 12.5.2005 an application was made apprehending forceful illegal dispossession and demolition of shops. It is not in dispute that the status quo order was passed. After the alleged demolition and eviction the application for restoration of status quo was filed with the necessary averments by the plaintiff-petitioners as contained in paragraphs 33, 34, 35 and 36 thereof. In paragraph 33 it was stated that having apprehension they had moved the Court on 12.5.2005 and the Court had passed the status quo order. In paragraph 34 there is a detailed narration how the learned Government Pleader informed the Collector and the Sub-divisional Officer and how the petitioners met them and what transpired there. In paragraph 35 they stated that they informed the Additional Collector at the spot of the order of the Court and he too passed contemptuous remarks about Court and sai