Fertilizer co fined Rs50L for ‘abuse of court process’

Nagpur: In an unprecedented and first-of-its-kind order, the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court on Wednesday directed petitioner company and intervener to pay a whopping amount of Rs50 lakh to the respondents within four weeks.
While dismissing the plea by Nagarjuna Agro Chemicals, agriculturist Anand Ambadwar’s PIL and Bhagwan Karmenge intervention application, a division bench comprising justices Ravi Deshpande and Milind Jadhav observed that all those are “actuated by ulterior motive of having commercial gain by eliminating the competition and creating monopoly using the process of the court”.
“This is nothing but an abuse of court’s process. The litigation is unnecessarily dragged on to spend court’s valuable time for several days,” the judges said while severally censuring the petitioners and intervener.
“The HC has to be intolerant to such situation and practice of filing such frivolous and vexatious litigation, without having any genuine interest and lacking in all bona fides. It needs to be curbed and treated with iron hands, so as to deter the litigants from taking a court for a ride by misusing its process,” they added.
The Indian Council for Agriculture Research (ICAR) and Indian Agriculture Research Institute (IARI) had jointly developed Soil Testing and Fertilizers Recommendation (STFR) technology. Both Delhi-based agencies commercialized it by issuing licenses to 14 companies/firms, including Nagarjuna. The company however entered into an agreement with Indian Institute of Soil Science (IISS), Bhopal in 2014 for improvement of STFR meter.
When its move was opposed by the ICAI and IARI, the company knocked HC’s doors seeking an inquiry into STFR’s manufacturing and marketing without having facility of testing of two mandatory parameters. It prayed for restraining STFR’s marketing without getting its validation at least in five different agro-climatic zones in the country.
The respondents — ICAR and IARI — through counsel Mugdha Chandurkar contended that Nagarjuna’s move to ink MOU with IISS was a violation of non-disclosure of technology know-how. IARI principal scientist SC Datta, who invented STFR, alleged that the company came out with ‘Mridaparikshak’ on its own by replicating the idea/concept of STFR meter, a programmable digital colorimeter with menu based interactive programme, dedicated to estimation of soil available nutrients.
He said it is a first-of-its-kind in India and is patent protected and can’t be copied. He added ‘Mridaparikshak’ does not display the soil testing technology developed and licensed by ICAR-IARI, but displays name of IISS.
Agreeing with the respondents, the judges said their research work reveals Nagarjuna has been instrumental in misleading and misrepresenting various government departments for commercial profiteering and gain without having any genuine interest in raising such issues. “We hold that the petitioners and intervener failed to make out any case of misrepresentation, mischief, cheating or fraud on the farmers or other beneficiaries in respect of commercialization of STFR Meter,” the judges said.
The judges made it clear that ICAR and IARI are government establishments comprising renowned scientists having expertise in the field and therefore their bona fides are unquestionable. “It’s unfortunate that one of IARI units — IISS, Bhopal — is licensing the promotion of commercial interest of Nagarjuna, which is having hostile attitude towards its parent establishment. We expect the respondent ICAR and IARI to take action for violation agreement against the petitioner and it possible blacklist it,” they said, before dismissing the company’s petitions.