By: Lalmohan PatnaikCUTTACK: The Orissa high court has ruled that a woman who is a domicile of Odisha will be exempt from paying court fee even if she becomes the citizen of another country.The judgement — the text of which was made available on Monday — was in response to a petition that challenged an order issued by a subordinate civil court exempting court fee of Rs 3.63 lakh to be payable by a woman who had filed a partition suit.Court fee is the amount charged by civil courts for adjudicating cases related to property inheritance, possession or dispute. A court fee is applicable even in the case of partition of property; each beneficiary has to deposit court fee in proportion to the value of his or her portion of the property.One Munmum Patnaik had instituted a suit in the court of civil judge (senior division) at Banki for declaration of title, partition and permanent injunction. While the suit was valued at Rs 1,11,84,300, Munmun was asked to pay court fee of Rs 3,63,931. She was later declared exempt from paying the fee for being a woman.A defendant in the suit, Sanjay Kumar Das, filed an application pointing out that she could not be exempted from paying the court fee as she had been a citizen of the US since 1991. The trial court at Banki rejected the application on December 4 last year, prompting Das to move the high court against the lower court’s order.The high court examined the notification governing court fees in the state and found that it allowed exemption to scheduled caste, scheduled tribe, women , minors, persons with disabilities, persons with annual income of less than or equal to Rs one lakh and persons entitled to legal aid.The single-judge bench of justice A K Rath ruled: “On a bare reading of the notification, it is evident that seven categories of persons, including women, are exempt from payment of court fees. The language of the notification is clear and explicit. The word ‘woman’ has not been pre-fixed by any adjective. It takes with its sweep women of any status or nationality.”“The court cannot interpret the same in a manner that will defeat the purpose of the notification. The plaintiff is a woman. In view of the notification issued by the state of Orissa, she is exempt from payment of court fees,” justice Rath said in his December 21 judgement.In his verdict, justice Rath observed that the order of the court of civil judge (senior division) in Banki ‘does not suffer from any illegality or infirmity warranting interference’.

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