Orissa HC Refuses To Quash FIR Against Lawyer Accused Of Taking Money From Client To Bribe Judge

Cuttack: The Orissa High Court has refused to quash a criminal case against a lawyer accused of taking over Rs 16 lakhs, and a gold chain and bracelet from a client on the pretext of using the same to bribe a judge for favorable bail orders in a case.

In a recent order, Justice Sibo Sankar Mishra dismissed the lawyer’s plea to quash the first information report (FIR) against him, while imposing costs of RS 10,000, Bar and Bench reported.

“The Court is not inclined to (quash the FIR) as the allegations are not only at a nascent stage of investigation but also as quite serious in nature as the name of a former Judge of this Court has been soiled,” the report quoted the Court as saying.

The HC also directed the State Bar Council to hold an inquiry into the allegations. The Court added that it could not discard the allegations made by the complainant-client since it was inconceivable for a common litigant to fabricate such a serious allegation against a lawyer or against a judge.

The accused lawyer had filed the present plea to quash a 2021 criminal case pending before a Cuttack trial court against him.

According to the FIR, the lawyer had been engaged to represent a man seeking bail after his arrest in a case under the Odisha Protection of Interests of Depositors Act (OPID Act). The arrested man’s wife (informant/ client) claimed that she paid Rs 16.35 lakhs to a person in Bhubaneswar on the instructions of the lawyer.

This apart, she claimed she gave the lawyer a gold chain (65 grams) and a gold bracelet (50 grams) meant for the marriage of a Judge’s daughter, who was to hear her husband’s bail application. Land deeds were also later transferred to the lawyer on his demand, she claimed.

The FIR included phone chats between the lawyer and the client and pictures as evidence. The informant alleged that after her husband’s bail was denied, the lawyer demanded an additional Rs 16 lakhs for a fresh application.

When she requested the return of the case files, land deeds, and money, the accused lawyer allegedly refused and threatened to file false cases, using his “connections” with judges to block her husband’s bail pleas.