JUDGMENT

The above writ petition is filed challenging the award dated 08.07.2015 in O.P

.No.77/2014 of the Permanent Lok Adalath Ernakulam, Ernakulam. The short point raised by the petitioner in this writ petition is that the Permanent Lok Adalath decided the matter without following the procedure in Section 22C of the Legal Services Authorities Act (herein after referred to as LSA Act for short). The learned counsel relied the judgment of this Court in 2022(1) KHC 350 [Assistant Executive Engineer, KSEB, Trivandrum and another v. Consumer Vigilance Centre, Trivandrum and others]. The learned counsel submitted that the Permanent Lok Adalath proceeded with the case in total violation of the statutory provisions as per the LSA Act.

2. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned counsel appearing for the contesting respondents.

3. The procedure to be adopted by the Permanent Lok Adalath was considered by this Court in detail in Assistant Executive Engineer's (supra) case. The relevant paragraph of the judgment in extracted hereunder:

“6. Section 22C (4) says that when statement, additional statement, and reply, if any, have been filed under sub-section (3), to the satisfaction of the Permanent Lok Adalat, it shall conduct conciliation proceedings between the parties to the application in such manner as it thinks appropriate taking into account the circumstances of the dispute. Section 22C(5) says that the Permanent Lok Adalat shall, during the conduct of conciliation proceedings under sub- section (4), assist the parties in their attempt to reach an amicable settlement of the dispute in an independent and impartial manner. Section 22C(6) says that it shall be the duty of every party to the application to cooperate in good faith with the Permanent Lok Adalat in conciliation of the dispute relating to the application and to comply with the direction of the Permanent Lok Adalat to produce evidence and other related documents before it. Section 22C(7)says that, When a Permanent Lok Adalat, in the aforesaid conciliation proceedings, is of opinion that there exist elements of settlement in such proceedings which may be acceptable to the parties, it may formulate the terms of a possible settlement of the dispute and give to the parties concerned for their observations and in case the parties reach at an agreement on the settlement of the dispute, they shall sign the settlement agreement and the Permanent Lok Adalat shall pass an award in terms thereof and furnish a copy of the same to each of the parties concerned. Thereafter, Section

22C(8) says that, Where the parties fail to reach at an agreement under sub-section (7), the Permanent Lok Adalat shall, if the dispute does not relate to any offence, decide the dispute. Therefore, a reading of Section 22(C) will show that the Permanent Lok Adalat should reach the stage of Section 22C(7)of the Act 1987 for deciding a dispute under Section 22C(8) .”

4. I perused Ext.P5 award. In Ext.P5 it is only stated that the authority conducted statutory conciliation under Section 22C (4) of the LSA Act, exploring the possibility of an amicable settlement of the dispute. It is also stated that the attempt did not succeed and therefore, it was taken up on merit under Section 22C (8) of the LSA Act. This is not enough. A detailed procedure is mentioned in the LSA Act before deciding a dispute under Section 22C (8). This Court considered the matter in detail in the above cited case and narrated the procedure to be adopted by the Permanent Lok Adalath in such situations.

5. According to me Ext.P:5 order is to be set aside and the matter is to be remanded back to the Permanent Lok Adalath for fresh consideration in accordance to law after following the principle la