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Judgment
Rakesh Kumar Jain, J.—This appeal is directed against the order of District Judge, Jalandhar dated 04.06.2009 by which objection filed by the appellants u/s 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (for short "the Act") has been dismissed on the ground of limitation.
Briefly, the sole arbitrator gave his award on 26.10.2006. The said award was challenged by the appellants by way of an appeal on 23.01.2007. However, on coming to know that appeal is not maintainable against the arbitral award as only objection could be filed u/s 34 of the Act, on 09.08.2007, appellant No. 1 - Karam Chand suffered the following statement:
Statement of Karam Chand appellant.
I do not want to proceed with the present appeal and the same be dismissed as withdrawn without prejudice to my right to file application u/s 34 of the Act.
On the basis of the aforesaid statement, following order was passed by the learned Court below on the same day:
In view of the statement of appellant, which has been separately recorded, this appeal is dismissed as withdrawn. File be consigned to the Record Room.
Thereafter, objection u/s 34 of the Act was filed on 10.08.2007. The said objection has been dismissed by the learned Court below on the ground that it is beyond limitation by observing that "even if for arguments sake, it is assumed that the said period is to be excluded, while computing the period of limitation for filing the application u/s 34 of the Act, even then, the applicant cannot succeed in this issue. He was required to prove as to during which period the appeal was being prosecuted in the said court. He has only given the date of withdrawal of the appeal and has not given the date on which the same was filed. In these circumstances, this Court is unable to compute the period during which that appeal was being prosecuted. Therefore, there is no question of excluding any such time. In these circumstances, the period of limitation of three months is to be computed from the date of passing of the award itself."
Aggrieved against the aforesaid order, present appeal has been filed by the appellants alongwith an application under Order 41 Rule 27 of the Civil Procedure Code, 1908 (for short "the C.P.C.") to lead additional evidence by way of placing on record documents Annexures P-1 to P-3 which are the grounds of appeal dated 23.01.2007 (P-1), statement of Karam Chand appellant dated 09.08.2007 (P-2) and the order of the District Judge, Jalandhar dated 09.08.2007 (P-3).
Since these documents are coming from the judicial record, therefore, the application filed under Order 41 Rule 27 of the C.P.C. is allowed and these documents are taken on record as additional evidence.
Learned Counsel for the appellants has submitted that since appeal u/s 34 was filed on 23.01 .2007 which was the 89th day and, thereafter, it was withdrawn on 09.08.2007 and the objection was filed on the very next day, i.e. on 10.08.2007. The objection was filed within the period of 90 days which could further be extended. Learned Counsel for respondent No. 1 has submitted that there is no error in the arbitral award and the appellants are liable to pay the amount which has been determined.
Insofar as the merit of the case is concerned, that has to be gone into by the Court below while deciding objection u/s 34 of the Act. This Court is only concerned with the question of limitation as to whether the period spent by the appellants before the Court below could be excluded in terms of Section 14 of the Limitation Act, 1963 or not. It is now settled by the Supreme Court as well as this Court that Section 14 of the Limitation Act, 1963 is applicable.
Thus, in my view, the documents, which have been placed on record now, which are borne out from the record of the Court below can be relied upon and as such the limitation is counted as per which the objection has been filed on the 90th day as envisaged u/s 34(3) of the Act.
In view of the above discussion, the appeal is allowed and the order dated 04.06.2009 is set aside. The case is remanded back to the District Judge, Jalandhar to decide the same on merits. The parties are directed to appear before the District Judge, Jalandhar on 20.09.2010.
Disposed of accordingly.