GENERAL MANAGER (PHONES) vs SUCHA SINGH

IT is an application for condonation of delay of 34 days in filing the appeal.

IT is stated in the application that copy of the impugned order was received by the appellant department on 11.11.1999. On receipt of the order, the matter was processed on file and submitted to the SDE (Legal Cell) by the dealing hands on 11.11.1999. The SDE (Legal) is incharge of the entire litigation work of the Amritsar District. Therefore, he remained occupied in various other important matters and could not attend the case earlier than 13.12.1999. On 13.12.1999, the SDE (Legal Cell) submitted the matter to DE (Phones) for his consideration. On 5.1.2000, D.E. (Phones) further sent the case to Director Finance for further submission to the General Manager (Telephones) for consideration. On 6.1.2000, the Director Finance sent the case to the General Manager (Telephones), who after considering the entire facts and circumstances of the case decided to challenge the order by way of filing the appeal before the Hon''ble State Commission at Chandigarh. IT is then stated in the application that Govt. Counsel was approached at Chandigarh for preparation and filing of the appeal, who made certain inquiries and asked for documents. Resultantly, the official who visited him came back at Amritsar to arrange the documents. After arranging the relevant documents, the official again visited the office of Standing Counsel on 13.1.2000 and handed over the documents to the Counsel. The Counsel thus filed the appeal on 17.1.2000. From the narration of the facts, we are unable to find any material on the record, which could show any reasonable ground to condone the delay of 34 days in filing the appeal. It was incumbent on the part of the applicant to explain each day''s delay in filing the appeal. But in this case, no effort has been made to explain the delay even for longer periods for which the case was kept by various Authorities without any action. No affidavit of the concerned Authorities explaining the time consumed to work on the file, is forthcoming. Resultantly, we do not find any ground to condone the delay of 34 days in filing the appeal. This application for condonation of delay is dismissed.

Consequently, this appeal is dismissed as time barred.

WE would like to observe that where there is such type of delay in filing the appeals, the highest Authority in the hierarchy should take appropriate legal/punitive action against the delinquent officials/officers, so that they become conscious for future and take appropriate immediate measures to file appeals before the Appropriate Authorities within time. Appeal dismissed.