Frivolous lawsuits could soon be a thing of the past

Senate panel has already cleared the bill and the upper house too could pave way for turning it into law

ISLAMABAD: With frivolous litigations clogging up the legal system, the capital is on the cusp of getting a new law which would minimise such lawsuits.

In this regard, the Senate Standing Committee on Law and Justice has voted in favour of the “The Costs of Litigation (Amendment) Bill, 2017,” and has recommended that the upper house pass the law as well.

Once the Senate grants its approval to the bill and the president signs it into law, the courts would be empowered to award the actual cost of litigation to the party who comes out on top. The courts can also impose a fine on the party seeking adjournments.

The bill, which would amend the civil and criminal laws, will initially be implemented in the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT). But it could later be expanded to the rest of the country.

Wasteful litigation

Frivolous litigations and inordinate delays owing to frequent adjournments in cases, on one pretext or another, not only consumes court’s time and public money which could be diverted towards resolving pending cases, but also adds unnecessary miseries onto the parties.

Senator Javed Abbasi, who chaired the meeting of the Senate panel which passed the amendment bill, noted that “the tendency of filing and vexatious case and taking baseless grounds for defense is unfortunately on the rise.”

As per the bill, before the final verdict in any case is announced, a party to the proceedings would have to submit details of the actual costs of their litigation beyond court fee, stamp fee, fee paid to the lawyer and all other ancillary or incidental expenses.

The bill, which would amend the Code of Civil Procedure 1908, and the Code of Criminal Procedure 1898, would allow courts to impose three types of costs including actual, adjournment and special.

According to the proposed amendments in the bill, the court would award the actual costs of litigation to the successful party with a mark-up not exceeding the prescribed limit per annum at the time of passing of the order.

Similarly, the court would be empowered to determine out of what property these costs are to be paid and recovered and to issue all necessary directions for this purpose.

Likewise, if any party seeks adjournment of any cases on a fixed date, the court could grant such adjournment on the condition that the party requesting the adjournment pay at least Rs5,000 to the other party for each adjournment sought.

Besides, if the court discovers that the allegations by one party are false or vexatious and that the petitioning party knew about it, the court could award special costs to other party.

In addition, during criminal proceedings, the party which intends to adjourn a fixed case would pay Rs10,000 for every adjournment.

However, if a complainant or informant can show the magistrate in such cases that the accusation was false or frivolous, the prosecution could be directed to pay compensation not exceeding Rs100,000 to the accused.

By imposing these costs, the court would be able to penalise parties for unnecessary delays, adjournments and frivolous petitions.

The amendment bill has already been passed by the National Assembly, and with the Senate panel granting its approval, it is likely that the Senate too would approve it once it is tabled in the upper house.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 2^nd, 2017.