It is “high time” West Bengal introduced a vexatious litigation law, the Calcutta High Court has said, and until then a frequent litigant’s petitions that look like PILs will not be registered as PILs without first going before a Bench.
Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court has asked the State’s law officers to take up with the Government the need for a vexatious litigation law in West Bengal, and has ordered that no future petition by a frequent litigant that resembles a PIL is to be registered as a PIL unless it is first placed before the appropriate Bench [Biplab Kumar Chowdhury v. State of West Bengal and Others].
A Division Bench of Chief Justice Ravindra Vithalrao Ghuge and Justice Om Narayan Rai passed the order in WPA(P) 298 of 2026 on October 15. Mr. Sayan Chattopadhyay appeared for the petitioner, Additional Advocate General Billwadal Bhattacharyya and other counsel for the State, and Mr. Sudarsan Roy and Mr. Diptarka Majumder for North Dum Dum Municipality.
What the Municipality put on record
The petitioner, Biplab Kumar Chowdhury, is described in the proceedings as an RTI activist, and the petition was one he sought to withdraw. On October 15 the Court added North Dum Dum Municipality as Respondent No. 12. The Municipality filed a compilation that included a report of October 14 from its Executive Officer, according to which the petitioner filed 316 RTI applications over nine years raising more than 1,000 queries, 10 of the applications within seven days. These figures are the Municipality’s contentions as placed before the Court.
The compilation also drew on earlier records: an order of September 22, 2022 in WPA 3116 of 2022 noting 195 cases by the petitioner, 43 of them PILs, and an order of August 17, 2023 of the State Information Commission disposing of 549 cases he had filed. On October 13 the petitioner’s counsel said the petitioner could recall about 116 petitions, 43 of them PILs. The Additional Advocate General submitted that it was a fit case for restricting the petitioner from filing any further PIL.
The directions of October 13, reproduced
The order reproduces directions first passed on October 13. There the Court asked the Additional Government Pleader to act in consultation with the Advocate General and urge the State to bring legislation, and said:
it is high time that the State of West Bengal introduces the Vexatious Litigation (Prevention) Act
Such an Act, the Court said, should be akin to those in force in Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu. As to future filings, it directed that a petition of the petitioner resembling a PIL:
would not be registered as a PIL unless it is placed before the appropriate Bench
Whether such a petition qualifies as a PIL is then for the appropriate Bench to decide. The petition before the Court was dismissed as withdrawn, without costs.
Earlier costs, and a draft handed over
The order records that costs of Rs 25,000 and Rs 50,000 had been imposed on the petitioner earlier. The Rs 25,000 was deposited; the Rs 50,000 balance was pending because a review petition had been filed. On October 15 a demand draft for Rs 50,000 dated October 13, drawn in favour of the West Bengal State Legal Services Authority, was tendered in compliance with an order of October 31, 2022 in WPA(P) 211 of 2022. The Court accepted it and told the Registry to hand it over to the Authority.
Statutes elsewhere, administrative control here
Counsel for the Municipality noted that Maharashtra has a Vexatious Litigation (Prevention) Act and West Bengal has none; Rajasthan, too, has a Vexatious Litigation (Prevention) Act, 2015. Such statutes generally let a court restrain a habitual filer of vexatious proceedings from instituting fresh ones without leave. The High Court did not restrain the petitioner under any statute; it acted through its administrative control over how petitions are registered.
RTI applications left open
The Municipality had asked that the petitioner be stopped from filing further RTI applications. The Court made no observation on restricting his RTI filings at this stage and left the Municipality free to pursue remedies before a competent forum or court, including under the High Court’s writ jurisdiction.
What the order does and leaves alone
The petitioner has not been barred from coming to the Court. What changes is the routing of his PIL-type filings: a Bench will decide at the threshold whether a petition is truly in public interest. That eases the burden of repeated filings on the Court without shutting the door on a petition that raises a real public question.
The call for legislation is a request to the State. Whether West Bengal brings in a law of the kind in force in Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu is for the State Government and the legislature to decide.
Case Title: Biplab Kumar Chowdhury v. State of West Bengal and Others [WPA(P) 298 of 2026]
Bench: Chief Justice Ravindra Vithalrao Ghuge and Justice Om Narayan Rai, Calcutta High Court
Date of Order: October 15, 2026
Appearances: Mr. Sayan Chattopadhyay for the petitioner; Additional Advocate General Billwadal Bhattacharyya, Mr. D.N. Ray (Government Pleader), Mr. Ajit Kumar Mishra (Additional Government Pleader), Mr. Loknath Chatterjee and Mr. Guddu Singh for the State; Mr. Sudarsan Roy and Mr. Diptarka Majumder for North Dum Dum Municipality