Sudhir Kumar Ojha

Patna, Nov. 21: If you are a celebrity, chances are you will meet your day of judgment in Muzaffarpur, courtesy Sudhir Kumar Ojha.

The north Bihar town famous for its litchis is fast earning a reputation of being the country’s conscience-keeper with Ojha, a practising lawyer, the custodian of morals.

Ask Sushil Kumar Modi, Anna Hazare, Arvind Kejriwal, Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Shah Rukh Khan his wife Gauri Khan, Bipasha Basu, Katrina Kaif, Vidya Balan, Sonakshi Sinha and Salman Khan. All of them have cases pending against them in one, or more, of the town’s courts.

Ojha, 45, is bent on dragging top personalities of the country to court if he believes justice hasn’t been done.

His latest targets are Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sachin Tendulkar. Ojha has filed a criminal complaint case against the Prime Minister, challenging the decision to award the Bharat Ratna to the cricket maestro. He has charged the Prime Minister with hurting “people’s sentiments”.

In his complaint petition filed in the court of the chief judicial magistrate, Muzaffarpur, Ojha has named Tendulkar, Union home minister Sushilkumar Shinde and sports minister Bhanwar Jitendra Singh as accused. The complaint says the decision to bestow the nation’s highest civilian honour on Tendulkar has hurt the people’s sentiments since the award ought to have been given to hockey legend Dhyanchand.

Ojha said the Bharat Ratna is given to persons who have spent their entire life towards enhancing the prestige and dignity of the nation. His contention is that having completed his cricket career at the age of 40, Tendulkar, in his future life, could err in his actions or deeds and this could bring the country into disrepute.

The matter will come up for hearing on December 10.

Ojha, who started practising law at Muzaffarpur civil court in 1996 a year after completing his LLB from the local SKJ Law College, told The Telegraph that his journey for justice began in 2005 when he filed a PIL in Patna High Court, challenging the railways decision to set up a zonal office in Patna instead of Hajipur. Then railway minister Lalu Prasad was made a party to the case, which Ojha won. The zonal office was opened at Hajipur.

He has so far filed 490 cases, which includes 100 against eminent personalities, in the civil court, vigilance court and high court.

One case that gave him satisfaction was getting Congress president Sonia Gandhi to apologise before the court for being depicted as goddess in the Moradabad Congress office.

“We have been seeing dharnas and demonstrations everywhere but they never yield any result. So I decided to pursue law as a career to use it (law) as a tool to nail law-breakers. It does not matter whosoever or howsoever high he or she may be,” Ojha said.

Some in Muzaffarpur also consider Ojha a publicity monger. They recalled that in December 2012, Ojha had filed a case in the chief judicial magistrate’s court against Shah Rukh and his wife Gauri, actress Aliya Bhatt and others for “hurting the religious sentiments of the people” through the song Radha Teri Chunri in the film Student of the Year. On the court’s directive, FIRs have been registered against the accused persons and an investigation is going on.

He has filed against actresses Bipasha Basu, Katrina Kaif, Vidya Balan and Bihar girl Sonakshi Sinha for “obscene photographs”. These cases too are pending.

“Ojha always files cases in every matter and has not spared any celebrity. He has filed cases against Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi, Lalu Prasad, Asaram Bapu and many film stars. He files cases for publicity. But yes, he has filed some genuine cases also, especially against the likes of (MNS leader) Raj Thackeray for denigrating the state (Bihar),” said Dhananjay Kumar Jha, who works with a private firm in Muzaffarpur.

“He has not left anyone — be it politicians, film stars or social activists. Some of his cases are genuine but most are meant to draw media attention,” said Vimal Kumar Singh, an officer with a pharma company in the town.

Ojha brushed off allegations that he was “publicity hungry”. “I am not fighting legal battles for personal gains or benefits. Had it been the case, I would not have sold 10 cottahs of land for this social cause. I fought the case against a court fee hike which the government had to withdraw following the decision by the high court.”

He, however, admitted that his penchant for dragging the high and the mighty to court has helped him earn a name for himself and establish his practice. “It gives me satisfaction when I fight against corruption and social evils,” Ojha said.