1 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 2025:CGHC:25754-DB NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR WPC No. 2591 of 2025 The Indian Hume Pipe Company Limited A Company Incorporated Under The Indian Companies Act, 1913 Having Its Registered Office At Construction House, 5, Walchand Hirachand Road, Ballard Estate, Mumbai - 400001 And Represented By Its Project Manager Namely Shri R. Alagarsamy, Son Of Shri A. Ramalingam, Aged About 57 Years And Having Zonal Office At Q - 10, Anupam Nagar, Raipur, Tehsil And District Raipur, Chhattisgarh. ... Petitioner versus 1 - Bhilai Municipal Corporation A Body Constituted Under The Relevant Provisions Of Chhattisgarh Municipal Corporation Act 1956, Having Its Office At Bhilai Municipal Corporation, Bhilai, District Durg Chhattisgarh. 2 - The Commissioner Bhilai Municipal Corporation, Bhilai, District Durg Chhattisgarh. ... Respondents (Cause title is taken from CIS) For Petitioner : Mr. B. P. Sharma, Advocate alongwith Mr. M. L. Sakat, Advocate. For Respondents : Mr. Amrito Das, Advocate SOURABH BHILWAR Digitally signed by SOURABH BHILWAR Date: 2025.06.19 17:29:37 +0530 2 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 Hon'ble Shri Ramesh Sinha, Chief Justice Hon'ble Shri Bibhu Datta Guru , Judge Judgment on Board Per Ramesh Sinha , Chief Justice 19.06.2025 1. Heard Mr. B. P. Sharma, Advocate alongwith Mr. M. L. Sakat, learned counsel for the petitioner. Also heard Mr. Amrito Das, learned counsel for the respondents. 2. By way of this petition, the petitioner has prayed for following reliefs:- “i. A writ of mandamus or any other appropriate writ, order, direction in the nature thereof directing the respondents to produce before this Hon'ble Court all the relevant records pertaining to the case of the petitioners for its kind perusal. ii. A writ of mandamus or any other appropriate writ, order, direction in the nature thereof directing the respondent authorities to make payment of the admitted dues as admitted by Respondents in the note sheets appended as Annexure in within the period fixed by this Hon'ble Court. AND/OR iii. A writ and/or an order in the nature of writ of mandamus to issue commanding and directing the respondent authorities to take a decision in objective manner and reply or decide the representations submitted by the petitioners (Annexure P-1(Colly)) in an objective manner within the time frame fixed by this 3 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 Hon'ble Court and law laid down in courts of law accordingly in the interest of justice. iv. Pass any other Order in favour of the Petitioner that this Hon'ble Court may deem fit in the interest of justice; and v. Allow the Instant Writ Petition with Costs.” 3. The petitioner has preferred this petition as the petitioner is aggrieved by the action of the respondent authorities in not responding/deciding the petitioners’ various representations. The petitioner has perform a work of public nature i.e. of design, laying, jointing, interconnection, testing and commissioning of clear water rising main under Bhilai Augmentation water supply Scheme part-II, distribution networks and upgrading and renovation of existing water distribution network under augmentation of water supply scheme part -II including 12 months trial, etc. in the area manage by Bhilai Municipal Corporation for supply of water, etc to the residents of the region and in this regard in the files of municipal corporation itself the work of completion by the petitioner has been admitted by the respondent authorities and note sheet also show payment of amount of the consideration as also for providing goods and rendering services, the charted accountant of the municipal corporation also certified in the files of the corporation and all these facts comes in the purview of admitted liability within its meaning under the law but the respondent authorities since last 4 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 2.5 years are avoiding payment of the amount due including G.S.T. payment, etc and also no action whatsoever has been taken in respect of the various representation dated 14.03.2024, 21.10.2024, 07.11.2024, 27.11.2024, 24.12.2024, 01.01.2025 which is also clear for the note sheet of the corporation. Thus unnecessarily inviting litigation for both the parties which is detrimental to their interest and the same may be avoided as the respondent contention in mutual discussion of making payment of receipt of the amount either by the taxpayer or by the State Government and on such oral assurance the petitioners have avoided litigation, however since the respondent authorities are not taking any steps for receipt of the funds or making of funds for the payment made to the petitioners. Hence, this petition. 4. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that the action of the respondent department caused mental agony and financial hardship to the petitioner and the respondent department has not made any attempt in solving the hindrance. The petitioner is seeking release of Final bill and GST reimbursement executed as per the contract agreement. He would submit that the concerned officers of Municipal Corporation has given an oral assurance of making payment to the petitioner as and when the funds will be available, however, it has been more than 2.5 years elapsed and till date, not a single penny has been paid to the petitioner. As such, the writ petition deserves to be allowed. He 5 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 relied upon the judgment of the Patna High Court in Raghoji House of Distribution Versus State of Bihar reported in 2022 SCC OnLine Pat 2368. He also placed reliance on the judgment passed in the matter of ABL International Ltd. & Anr. vs. Export Credit Guarantee Corporation of India Ltd. & Ors. reported in (2004) 3 SCC 553. 5. On the other hand, learned respondents counsel opposes the submissions made by the learned counsel for the petitioner and submits that the writ petition as framed and filed is not maintainable as the disputed question of facts cannot be adjudicated in writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. He would categorically submit that the petitioner instead of approaching this Court by filing writ petition, ought to have preferred a suit for specific performance before the concerned competent jurisdictional civil Court. 6. We have heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the impugned order and other documents appended with writ appeal. 7. It is settled law that the High Court should not exercise its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India when it raises disputed question of facts. 8. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Chairman, Grid Corpornation of Orissa Ltd. (GRIDCO) and others v. 6 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 Sukamani Das (Smt.) and another, (1999) 7 SCC 298 was dealing with the question of whether the High Court had made an error in entertaining a writ petition filed seeking compensation for the death of a person due to electrocution, which had allegedly been caused due to the negligence of the authorities. The Supreme Court in the said case observed as under: "6. In our opinion, the High Court committed an error in entertaining the writ petitions even though they were not fit cases for exercising power under Article 226 of the Constitution. The High Court went wrong in proceeding on the basis that as the deaths had taken place because of electrocution as a result of the deceased coming into contact with snapped live wires of the electric transmission lines of the appellants, that "admittedly/prima facie amounted to negligence on the part of the appellants". The High Court failed to appreciate that all these cases were actions in tort and negligence was required to be established firstly by the claimants. The mere fact that the wire of the electric transmission line belonging to Appellant 1 had snapped and the deceased had come in contact with it and had died was not by itself sufficient for awarding compensation. It also required to be examined whether the wire had snapped as a result of any negligence of the appellants and under which circumstances the deceased had come in contact with the wire. In view of the specific defences raised by the appellants in each of these cases they 7 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 deserved an opportunity to prove that proper care and precautions were taken in maintaining the transmission lines and yet the wires had snapped because of circumstances beyond their control or unauthorised intervention of third parties or that the deceased had not died in the manner stated by the petitioners. These questions could not have been decided properly on the basis of affidavits only. It is the settled legal position that where disputed questions of facts are involved a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is not a proper remedy. The High Court has not and could not have held that the disputes in these cases were raised for the sake of raising them and that there was no substance therein. The High Court should have directed the writ petitioners to approach the civil court as it was done in OJC No. 5229 of 1995." (emphasis supplied) 9. The aforesaid judgment has been relied/ reiterated by the Supreme Court in S.P.S. Rathore v. State of Haryana and others, (2005) 10 SCC 1 wherein it observed as follows: "16. In Chairman, Grid Corpn. of Orissa Ltd. (Gridco) v. Sukamani Das [(1999) 7 SCC 298] the question which arose for consideration was, can the High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution award compensation for death caused due to electrocution on account of negligence, when the liability was emphatically denied on the ground that the death had not occurred as a result of negligence, but because of an act of God or of acts 8 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 of some other persons. The Court held that it is the settled legal position that where disputed questions of facts are involved, a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is not a proper remedy. Therefore, questions as to whether death occurred due to negligence or due to act of God or of some third person could not be decided properly on the basis of affidavits only, but should be decided by the civil court after appreciating the evidence adduced by the parties. In T.N. Electricity Board v. Sumathi [(2000) 4 SCC 543] it was held that when a disputed question of fact arises and there is clear denial of any tortious liability, remedy under Article 226 of the Constitution may not be proper. The Court carved out exception to this general rule by observing that, it should not be understood that in every case of tortious liability, recourse must be had to a suit. When there is negligence on the face of it and infringement of Article 21 is there, it cannot be said that there will be any bar to proceed under Article 226 of the Constitution." (emphasis supplied) 10. Similarly, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Shubhas Jain v. Rajeshwari Shivam, 2021 SCC OnLine SC 562 has held as under: "26. It is well settled that the High Court exercising its extraordinary writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, does not adjudicate hotly disputed questions of facts. It is not for the High Court to make a comparative assessment of conflicting technical reports and decide which one is 9 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 acceptable." 11. Subsequently, in Union of India Vs. Puna Hinda, (2021) 10 SCC 690, the Hon'ble Supreme Court has observed: "24. Therefore, the dispute could not be raised by way of a writ petition on the disputed questions of fact. Though, the jurisdiction of the High Court is wide but in respect of pure contractual matters in the field of private law, having no statutory flavour, are better adjudicated upon by the forum agreed to by the parties. The dispute as to whether the amount is payable or not and/or how much amount is payable are disputed questions of facts. There is no admission on the part of the appellants to infer that the amount stands crystallised. Therefore, in the absence of any acceptance of joint survey report by the competent authority, no right would accrue to the writ petitioner only because measurements cannot be undertaken after passage of time. Maybe, the resurvey cannot take place but the measurement books of the work executed from time to time would form a reasonable basis for assessing the amount due and payable to the writ petitioner, but such process could be undertaken only by the agreed forum i.e. arbitration and not by the writ court as it does not have the expertise in respect of measurements or construction of roads." 12. Recently, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of M.P. Power Management Co. Ltd. v. Sky Power Southeast Solar India (P) Ltd., (2023) 2 SCC 703, while dealing with the issue of exercise 10 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 of writ jurisdiction by a Court in matters arising out of a contract, has stated: "82.7. The existence of an alternate remedy, is, undoubtedly, a matter to be borne in mind in declining relief in a writ petition in a contractual matter. Again, the question as to whether the writ petitioner must be told off the gates, would depend upon the nature of the claim and relief sought by the petitioner, the questions, which would have to be decided, and, most importantly, whether there are disputed questions of fact, resolution of which is necessary, as an indispensable prelude to the grant of the relief sought. Undoubtedly, while there is no prohibition, in the writ court even deciding disputed questions of fact, particularly when the dispute surrounds demystifying of documents only, the Court may relegate the party to the remedy by way of a civil suit." (emphasis supplied) 13. A reading of the aforesaid judgments makes it clear that it is well settled proposition of law that when there are disputed question of facts involved in a case, the High Court should not exercise its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. It has been held that the remedy under Article 226 of the Constitution of India may not be proper. 14. From perusal of the pleadings, it appears that the petitioner has prayed for issuance of direction towards the respondents to make payment of the admitted dues by the respondent 11 WPC No. 2591 of 2025 authorities in their note sheets; is contingent upon the resolution of the disputed question of facts raised, and these questions cannot be adjudicated under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. In view of the aforesaid, it would not be appropriate for this Court to entertain the instant writ petition as there are disputed questions of fact involved. 15. Considering the submissions advanced by learned counsel for the parties, further considering the disputed questions of law involved in this writ petition, the relief sought by the petitioner and in view of law laid down by the Supreme Court in the above- stated judgments (supra), we do not find any good ground to entertain this writ petition. 16. Accordingly, the writ petition being devoid of merit is liable to be and is hereby dismissed. However, liberty is reserved in favour of the petitioner to take recourse to other alternate remedies available to him under the law. No cost(s). Sd/- Sd/- (Bibhu Datta Guru) (Ramesh Sinha) Judge Chief Justice S.Bhilwar/ Gowri