Petitioner and his driver face contempt for secretly filming court proceedings on mobile phone: Rajasthan HC

Jaipur: The Rajasthan High Court has initiated contempt proceedings against a litigant and his driver after the driver was caught secretly recording courtroom proceedings on a mobile phone. Justice Anoop Kumar Dhand passed the order on 11 May 2026 while hearing five connected criminal miscellaneous petitions filed by Kamal Rathore and Manoj Kumar Meena.

The incident unfolded inside Justice Dhand’s courtroom in Jaipur during the hearing of the petitions. The Court spotted one Anil Suman, a resident of Village Diwali in Tehsil and Police Station Atru, Baran district, holding up his mobile phone and filming the proceedings without any permission.

When confronted, Suman attempted to delete some of the recorded clips before the Court could examine them. On being asked why he was filming the hearing, he told the Bench that he was the driver of petitioner Kamal Rathore and that he was recording the proceedings in Rathore’s case. Suman admitted before the Court that he had recorded the proceedings on his phone.

Recording of High Court proceedings is expressly prohibited under Rule 3(vi) of the Rajasthan High Court Rules for Video Conferencing for Courts, 2020. The rule lays down that there shall be no unauthorised recording of the proceedings by any person or entity. The Court noted that filming a sitting Bench without permission attracts criminal contempt under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, which empowers the High Court to punish acts that interfere with the administration of justice.

The Court held that the act of both Anil Suman and Kamal Rathore squarely fell within the definition of criminal contempt. It observed that the conduct amounted to a “serious interference with Administration of Justice” and made out a prima facie case under the 1971 Act. In plain terms, the Court was saying that this was not a minor procedural lapse but conduct serious enough to derail proper hearings.

Justice Dhand relied on the Supreme Court’s ruling in Arundhati Roy, In RE, reported in (2002) 3 SCC 343, where the Apex Court explained why the law of contempt exists at all. The Bench was addressing the question of why secret recording of judicial proceedings is treated so seriously. It quoted the Supreme Court as follows:

“The law of contempt has been enacted to secure public respect and confidence in the judicial process. If such confidence is shaken or broken, the confidence of the common man in the institution of judiciary and democratic set-up is likely to be eroded which, if not checked, is sure to be disastrous for the society itself.”

That observation, the Bench reasoned, captured exactly the harm caused by secret filming inside a courtroom. It chips away at the dignity of the institution and at the trust of the ordinary litigant who walks in expecting a fair hearing. “In the considered opinion of this Court, recording of the Court proceedings, as indicated above, constitutes a contempt of court as it amounts to interference with the administration of justice and also it lowers down the dignity of this Court,” the Bench held.

Importantly, the Court did not stop with Suman. It held that the responsibility also extended to the petitioner Kamal Rathore, since Suman had told the Bench that he was filming the hearing in his capacity as Rathore’s driver and in Rathore’s own case. The Bench further noted that Suman’s conduct amounted to intentionally causing interruption in judicial proceedings, a separate wrong that travels beyond the law of contempt.

The Bench directed that notice be issued to both Kamal Rathore and Anil Suman, calling upon them to show cause as to why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against them. The Registrar (Judicial) was ordered to lodge a report against Anil Suman and to seize his mobile phone, place it in safe custody, and direct the Station House Officer of Police Station Ashok Nagar, District Jaipur City (West), to take appropriate legal action against him.

Because the contemptuous conduct had taken place before the same Bench, the Court further directed the Registrar (Judicial) to place all the matters before the Hon’ble Acting Chief Justice with a request to list them before an appropriate Bench, excluding the present Bench.

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