Pushpanjali Tie Up Pvt. Ltd. v. Renudevi Choudhary
In the High Court of Bombay
Appeal (Lodging) 302/2014 in Notice of Motion 192/2014 in Suit 131/2014
Before Justice S.J. Vazifdar and Justice B.P. Colabawalla
Decided on August 07, 2014

Relevancy of the case: Receiving an email and having knowledge of the contents of the email.

Statutes & Provisions Involved

• The Information Technology Act, 2000 (Section 13)
• The Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (Order 39 Rule 2A)

Relevant Facts of the Case

• The appellant had filed this suit for an order directing the respondent to transfer the balance shares, lying in various accounts of respondents, into the DP account which was handed over as collateral security in pursuance of certain agreements and a permanent injunction restraining respondents from selling, transferring and/or alienating the balance shares lying in their DP accounts, including the pool account.
• The appellant has filed the present appeal challenging the transfer/confiscation of the shares, which are the subject matter of the suit, on the ground that the transfer was in breach of an ad-interim order. By the ad-interim order, the respondents were restrained from transferring the balance shares lying in their DP accounts which were handed over to them as collateral security under the loan agreements. However, this order ceased to exist.
• In the present case, the appellant seeks inter-alia the same interlocutory reliefs that the respondent has committed a breach of the ad-interim order.
• When the ad-interim order was passed, a copy of the same was served to the respondent on the same day by several emails. The appellant accordingly contends that the respondent had notice of the ad-interim order and despite the same, they committed a breach by transferring/forfeiting the shares.

Opinion of the Bench

Justice J. Vazifdar:

• The appellant has claimed that a copy of the ad-interim order was sent to the respondents by several emails. But the respondents claim that they learnt about the emails the next day when it was emailed since their working hours were over when the email was sent.
• It is not unbelievable that the respondents did not read the emails as they were delivered after the closing hours of the concerned department of the respondents.
• Also, the appellant was directed by the ad-interim order, to serve a copy of the order to the respondents by hand delivery which the appellant did not do and has no explanation for the same.
• A person may be said to have received an electronic record when it enters his computer resource but it does not necessarily mean or follow that he had the knowledge of either the receipt or the contents of the same at that time which is at the very moment of the receipt of the electronic record. Section 13 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 does not talk about any fixed time when a person is considered to have acquired the knowledge of an electronic record.
• Therefore, a person cannot be held guilty of committing a breach of an order on the basis of this assumption that he had the knowledge of the electronic record just because he received it.

Final Decision

• The present appeal is dismissed because it is evidently clear that the respondents did not have any knowledge of the order which was emailed to them.