PRAMILA UPADHYA Vs. ELECTRONICS INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners, defendants in a suit for declaration and permanent injunction (T.S. No. 349 of 2005), had filed their written statement beyond the time limit stipulated in Order VIII Rule 1, Civil Procedure Code (hereafter the Code). A plea was set up before the learned Civil Judge (Junior Division), 2nd Court at Sealdah, who is in seisin of the suit, that the written statement could not be prepared for want of documents, which the plaintiff sought to rely on to establish his claim in the plaint. The learned Judge was of the view that prior to September 8, 2009, the defendants did not make any prayer for direction on the plaintiff to file documents required for preparation of the written statement. The delay of 46 (forty-six) months in filing the written statement that had occurred in the meanwhile was so long that it could not be condoned. Accordingly, rejection of the prayer of the defendants/petitioners for acceptance of the written statement followed.

(2.) In this application under Article 227 of the Constitution, the defendants/petitioners call in question propriety of the order dated December 7, 2009 passed by the learned Judge.

(3.) Mr. Ghosh, learned advocate for the defendants/petitioners contended that delay in filing the written statement was occasioned not because of any lapse or negligence on the part of the defendants/petitioners. The delay actually resulted owing to the plaintiff/opposite party s inability to furnish to the defendants/petitioners copies of the documents it intended to rely on in support of the plaint case. The learned Judge, according to him, committed gross jurisdictional error in not appreciating the response of the defendants/petitioners in the proper perspective and has passed an order, which is perverse.