Gujarat High Court Refuses to Condone 2048-Day Delay, Says Litigants Must Keep Track of Their Cases

The Gujarat High Court has rejected an application seeking condonation of a huge delay in filing a plea due to insufficient cause.

The petitioner, Manav Utthan Sewa Samiti, requested the court to condone the delay of 2048 days (more than five and a half years) in filing the captioned application for restoring the original matter. The original writ petition was dismissed on 07.01.2020, due to the absence of the petitioner’s advocate during the hearing.

The applicant submitted that it did not know about the dismissal of the original petitioner. Since it was not in contact with the advocate, it thought that the case was still pending. The Samiti also highlighted the problems caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and changes in the persons handling the court proceedings.

The applicant’s lawyer said that some time was spent trying to contact the previous lawyer. When he could not be contacted, they needed more time to get legal advice. The applicant said that the delay was unintentional.

However, the Court believed that the explanation was not enough to condone the huge delay of 2048 days. The court said that even though litigants should not suffer due to the mistake of their lawyers, those who do not keep track of their cases cannot be protected under such a principle. Under this rule, only the illiterate litigants who are unaware of the court’s proceedings and misguided by the counsel are excluded. In the present case, the petitioner was represented by a competent advocate and could have accessed the case proceedings.

The Court also noted that the land was sold to Azadbhai Chatrubhai Romaliya through a registered sale deed. Since the applicant recently came to know about the sale deed, it filed this application. Due to the petitioner’s delay, the court said that third-party interests have arisen, and in such a case, the delay cannot be condoned.

As a result, the application for condonation of delay was rejected.