High Court allowed an application filed by the Union of India (“first respondent”, hereafter) under section 5 of the Limitation Act, 1963 (“Limitation Act”, hereafter) and thereby condoned the delay of around 479 days in presentation of an appeal from the decision of the Reference Court under section 18 of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894. (Para 1)
Whether the High Court was justified in condoning the delay in presentation of the appeal. In the process, we need to necessarily consider whether the first respondent had shown sufficient cause for which the appeal could not be presented within the prescribed period of limitation. (Para 2)
He pointed out that the reasons cited were not reasonable by any measure, and that the same were habitual unacceptable explanations meted out in such land acquisition matters to seek condonation of delay. (Para 7)
The delay in applying for the certified copy of the order of the Reference Court, according to him, was mainly due to unprofessional conduct of the concerned counsel and so implored Mr. Sen that such conduct should not have any bearing in the mind of the Court to nip a meritorious claim of the first respondent in the bud, particularly when stakes are high and the public exchequer is likely to be unnecessarily drained if the impugned order were interdicted. (Para 11)
The High Court, in due exercise of its discretion, had chosen the pragmatic path while noting that the negligence in pursuing the appeal did not amount to callousness; it was in this light that the High Court had condoned the delay after imposing heavy costs on the first respondent. (Para 13)
The exercise of discretion by the High Court has to be tested on the anvil of the liberal and justice oriented approach expounded in the aforesaid decisions which have been referred to above. We find that the High Court in the present case assigned the following reasons in support of its order (Para 31)
Given these reasons, we do not consider discretion to have been exercised by the High Court in an arbitrary manner. The order under challenge had to be a clearly wrong order so as to be liable for interference, which it is not. (Para 32)
That the impugned order reasonably condones the delay caused in presenting the appeal (Para 38)
SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
2023 STPL(Web) 319 SC
[2023 INSC 885]
Sheo Raj Singh (Deceased) Through Lrs. & Ors. Versus Union Of India & Anr.
Civil Appeal No. 5867 of 2015-Decided on 9-10-2023
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