Shyamubai And Others vs Ravi @ Ravindra And Another

Heard on I.A. No.5270 of 2019, an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act for condoning delay of 1344 days in filing the petition for restoration of M.A. No.485/2015, which was dismissed in default vide order dated 13.10.2015 passed by Principal Registrar of this Court in compliance of peremptory order dated 31.08.2015 for not curing the defect of filing deficit Court fees within stipulated time.

Facts reveal that a Claim Case No.68 of 2011 was filed by the petitioners, which was allowed vide award dated 18.11.2014 but the learned Tribunal exonerated the Insurance Company from liability to pay compensation. Against the award, the petitioners preferred appeal, which was dismissed as stated in preceding para.

Cause shown for delay in filing the present application/petition is as under:-

"2. That, applicants filed the misc. appeal before this Hon'ble Court for the enhancement of amount of compensation and to set aside the finding of exoneration of the insurance company from its legal liability to pay the amount of compensation to the poor claimants/applicants and the said appeal was listed on 31.08.2015 before this Hon'ble Court in common conditional order and the Hon'ble Court was pleased to grant six weeks time to pay ad valorem Court fees as per valuation in appeal and It was also directed that in case of failing which the appeal shall stand dismissed without any reference to the Court.

That, the counsel for applicants intimated the same to the local counsel of the claimants/applicants to arrange & deposit the deficit stamp duty within six weeks.

That, after receiving the intimation, the counsel at Sardarpur, called the applicants/widow and children of the deceased & told them to arrange the money to pay the deficit Court fees within the time stipulated time limit.

That, after intimating the applicants the counsel got busy in his Court work and applicants got busy in their routine work in arranging the deficit Court fees and forgot to intimate about the arrangement of Court fees.

That, in the first week of July, 2019 when the applicants came to the office of local counsel at Sardarpur and asked about the proceedings in the matter and present status of the appeal, then local counsel for the applicants checked the status of the case and came to know about the dismissal of the case in default of non-payment of court fees amount on 13.10.2015.

That, the after arranging the funds, the applicants meet their counsel on 05th of July 2019 and told him to deposit the said court fees in the matter, but during that time the case was dismissed by the office of this Hon'ble Court on 13.10.2015 in non compliance of peremptory order dated 31.08.2015. Then the applicants instructed their counsel to prepare the present restoration petition and filed the same without any further delay."

The appeal (M.A. No.485/2015) was filed by the petitioners on 28.02.2015 and the defect was pointed out by the office on the same day, but the same was not cured. None appeared before the Principal Registrar, even, who directed to list the case before the Court several times. Thrice, the common conditional orders were passed asking the petitioners to submit deficit Court fees but for next 8 months, the Court fees was not submitted. It is not the case that the Counsel was not aware about the deficiency of the Court fees but even then the appeal was filed without submitting proper Court fees. Since the day one, the Counsel was aware that the Court fees being filed by him is not sufficient but even then the appeal was filed with insufficient Court fees and the defect was not cured for next 8 months. Even after dismissal of the appeal, nobody cared for that for next four years and even, the dismissal was not taken seriously.

It cannot be believed that advocate, who regularly files such type of appeals was not aware of the deficiency of court fees and did not file appropriate Court fees "due to oversight mistake". The casualness reflects from the facts mentioned in the application that even after getting information of deficit Court fees, the petitioners as well as their Counsels got busy in their routine work and forgot to file the Court fees.

Neither the day to day delay is explained nor the cause shown for the delay appears sufficient, therefore, such a huge delay of four years cannot be condoned.

Resultantly, the application as well as the petition filed in pursuant thereto are dismissed.