Retrieve Calcutta High Court orders¶

CalcuttaHCClient queries the court's own website for a case and its published orders. It is a separate source from the national High Court Services portal.

Search and download¶

Install bharat-judgements[ocr] for automatic CAPTCHA input, or use the manual fallback. This example queries WPA 12886 of 2024 on the Appellate Side; it does not assume any number of returned orders or their contents.

import asyncio
from pathlib import Path
from bharat_judgements import CalcuttaHCClient


async def main():
    destination = Path("orders")
    destination.mkdir(exist_ok=True)
    async with CalcuttaHCClient() as client:
        case, orders = await client.search_orders(
            case_type="12", case_number="12886", year="2024", establishment="appellate"
        )
        if case is not None:
            print(case.case_number, case.cnr_number, case.petitioner, case.respondent)
        for index, order in enumerate(orders, start=1):
            print(order.order_date, order.order_type, order.pdf_url)
            if order.pdf_url:
                content = await client.download_order_pdf(order.pdf_url)
                (destination / f"order-{index}.pdf").write_bytes(content)


asyncio.run(main())

Use an empty destination folder when rerunning this example to avoid overwriting files from a previous query. The numeric 12 code represents WPA in this example; confirm the code for another case type on the court's search form.

Understand the return value¶

search_orders returns a pair: (CaseInfo | None, list[CaseOrder]). Always unpack both values. A case can have metadata but no published orders. An unmatched case may return (None, []).

Each order can carry its date, type, judge, neutral citation and PDF URL. Do not assume every field or PDF is present. download_order_pdf(url) returns bytes and rejects a response that is not a PDF.

Choose an establishment¶

The default is appellate. The client also accepts a raw establishment code; use one only when verified against the portal.

CLI equivalent¶

Add the cli extra for this command:

bharat-judgements --json calcuttahc search --case-type 12 --case-number 12886 --year 2024 --establishment appellate

Add --download orders to save available PDFs. Inspect the returned metadata before using the documents.

Limits and failures¶

This client retrieves the record and PDFs the website exposes; it is not a complete historical index. It does not return a full hearing history. Use HC Services CNR lookup for the richer live case page or the archive for historical judgments.

max_captcha_attempts defaults to five. Each retry uses a fresh session. Empty results, exhausted CAPTCHA attempts and invalid PDF responses are different outcomes; preserve that distinction in your application.

Next: client API, CAPTCHA options, or source coverage.