Wilful or deliberate disobedience of a court order is necessary to constitute civil contempt under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.

B.P. Katakey, J.

1. The applicants, who are the appellants in Writ Appeal No. 272/2007, filed the present application under Section 12 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 (for short the 'Act') read with Article 215 of the Constitution of India for initiating the proceeding against the respondents under the provisions of the Act alleging wilful disobedience of the order dated 25.6.2007 passed in the aforesaid writ appeal.

2. The applicants as writ petitioners filed WP(C) No. 367 (AP)/2006 questioning the legality and validity of the orders of appointment dated 10.7.2006 issued by the Secretary, Social Welfare and Child Development Department, Govt. of Arunachal Pradesh appointing the respondents in the said writ petition, which was disposed of by the learned single Judge vide judgment and order dated 1.6.2007 refusing to interfere with the impugned appointment orders in exercise of the power conferred under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, however, directing the respondent authorities to take steps for making requirement to the posts in accordance with the Rules as well as in compliance with the requirement of constitutional scheme of public employment, as expeditiously as possible preferably within a period of two months from the date of receipt of a copy of the order.

3. Being aggrieved, the applicants preferred the aforesaid writ appeal, which was admitted vide order dated 25.6.2007. An interim direction as prayed for was also passed on 25.6.2007. The applicants, thereafter, filed the present application seeking initiation of the contempt proceeding against the respondents herein, namely; the persons holding the office of the Chief Secretary; Secretary, Department of Social Welfare and Child Development and the Director of the said department, under the provisions of the Act alleging that though the certified copies of the order, dated 25.6.2007 passed in the writ appeal were submitted to the respondents herein on 4.7.2007 they did not comply with the interim direction issued by this Court by not suspending the orders of appointment dated 10.7.2006 issued in favour of the private respondents in the appeal. It has further been alleged that the interim direction issued by this Court has been deliberately and wilfully disobeyed by the respondents herein.

4. Notices being issued, the respondents showed causes by filing two affidavits, one by the respondent Nos. 1 and 3 and the other by respondent No. 2 taking the stand that there was no wilful or deliberate disobedience of the interim direction issued by this Court and in fact such interim direction has been complied with by issuing the order dated 30.10.2007, whereby the services of the private respondents in the appeal have been suspended except one respondent who had in the meantime resigned from service. According to respondents, the delay in compliance with the interim direction passed by this Court on 25.6.2007 was due to the fact that the copy of the memo of writ appeal filed by the present applicants was not made available along with the copy of the order dated 25.6.2007 containing the interim direction and because of non availability of the copy of such memo of appeal it could not immediately be ascertained what was the interim direction issued on 25.6.2007. The further stand in the affidavits is that after receiving the copy of the memo of appeal filed in the writ appeal, the advice and opinion from the concerned department as well as from the learned Advocate General were obtained and on receipt of the same, ultimately vide order dated 30.10.2007, the orders of appointment dated 10.7.2006 has been suspended. The respondents in their affidavits have also tendered their unqualified and unconditional apology for the delay in implementing the interim direction issued by this Court, in view of the aforesaid reasons.

5. We have heard Mr. K.N. Choudhury, learned senior counsel for the applicants and also Mr. N. Dutta, the learned Advocate General appearing on beh