The Karnataka High Court recently ordered action against a city civil court judge for citing non-existent judgments of the Supreme Court in its decision in an application under Code of Civil Procedure. .In an order passed on March 24, High Court judge Justice R Devdas said the act of the civil judge was disturbing and the matter would require further probe."What is more disturbing is the fact that the learned judge of City Civil Court has cited two decisions which were never decided by the Apex Court or any other Court. The learned Senior Counsel appearing for the plaintiffs has clearly stated that such decisions were not cited by the learned counsel for the plaintiffs. This act on the part of the learned judge would require further probe and appropriate action in accordance with law," the Court said..The Court was hearing a revision petition challenging the city civil court's decision on an application questioning its jurisdiction in a matter stated to be involving a commercial dispute.Senior Counsel Prabhuling Navadgi, representing the petitioners, had told the High Court in January that their application was rejected solely on the basis of citations (judgments cited by the civil court) which did not exist.These judgements appeared to have been “fraudulently manufactured” as there exist no records for the same either on the relevant courts’ websites or on any other official records, Navadgi had told the court.“It happens sometimes when one uses artificial intelligence programs and chatbots such as ChatGPT, AI might generate fictional results. It sometimes makes things up. I don’t know what happened here but these judgements do not exist,” he had said..The High Court took note of these allegations about non-existent Supreme Court rulings and ordered,"Copy of this order shall be placed before Hon’ble the Chief Justice, for further action against the learned judge.".Further, the Court allowed the revision plea as it found that the entities who had earlier filed a commercial suit had withdrawn the suit without any liberty and thereafter filed a suit before the civil court."This is an ingenious method adopted by the plaintiffs seeking to maintain a suit before a court which had no jurisdiction," it said..Senior Counsel Prabhling K Navadgi with advocate Chintan Chinnappa represented the petitioners.Senior Counsel Shyam Sunder with advocate BKS Sanjay represented the respondents..[Read Judgment]
