R. P. Chhabra vs Securities And Exchange Board Of India

Tarun Agarwala, Presiding Officer

We have heard learned counsel for the parties. Against the order of Securities and Exchange Board of India (“SEBIâ€) August 03, 2015 and

August 14, 2015 several appeals were filed by the company and its directors which were disposed of by this Tribunal by a common order dated June

29, 2018. The appellant being aggrieved by the order of the Tribunal filed an appeal before the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, being Civil

Appeal No. 6568 of 2019. The said appeal was dismissed as withdrawn by the Hon’ble Supreme Court on September 02, 2019. The order of the

Hon’ble Supreme Court is extracted hereunder.

“1. Learned senior counsel appearing for the appellant has prayed for liberty to withdraw this appeal to file review application before the

concerned appellate Tribunal.

The appeal is dismissed as withdrawn with the above-mentioned liberty.â€​

Based on the aforesaid order the Review Application was filed before this Tribunal on October 22, 2019 without any application for condoning the

delay. Subsequently, an application dated January 24, 2020 was filed praying for condoning the delay, if any, in filing the Review Application.

The ground urged is that the appellant had been bonafidely pursuing its remedy and had immediately filed an appeal before the Hon’ble

Supreme Court within the stipulated period as provided under law but subsequently on the prayer of the learned counsel for the appellant liberty was

given to the appellant to enable the appellant to file a Review Application before this Tribunal which liberty was granted by the Hon’ble Supreme

Court in its order dated September 02 2019. It was thus urged that immediately thereafter the Review Application was filed and therefore there is no

undue delay on the part of the appellant.

Having heard the learned counsel for the applicant, we are of the view, that there is an inordinate delay of 450 days as per the report of the registry

in filing the Review Application. The time to file a Review Application starts running from the date when the Tribunal passed an order. The period of

limitation starts from that date of the order of the Tribunal and not from the date when the Hon’ble Supreme Court had passed the order on

September 02, 2019. We also find that the Hon’ble Supreme Court had not condoned the delay but only granted liberty to file a review if they so

desire. Considering the aforesaid, we do not find any reason to condone the inordinate delay of 450 days at this stage. The Misc. Application is

rejected as a result of which the Review Application is also rejected without any order on costs.