High Court frowns on Frivolous pleas for Ignoring Delay

The High Court of Punjab & Haryana has made it clear that keeping track of his case was the “bounden duty” of a petitioner; & decades-old excuses for not keeping in touch with the counsel, such as being mentally upset, could no more be accepted by the Courts. It was time to denounce & turn down such thoughtless petitions.

Justice Ramendra Jain of the High Court said that “It is pertinent to mention here that such types of frivolous/false pleas are taken in routine by every litigant for the past three to four decades. Much water has already flown. Now the time has come to deprecate & reject such type of frivolous pleas, taken in routine to abuse the process of law. More so, ignorance of law is no excuse".

The assertion came on a revision plea challenging an appellate Court decision dated July 29, 2017, affirming the Trial Court Judgment dated Jan 23, 2014, whereby he was convicted in a cheque bounce case under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act & sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for a year & pay Rs3,000 as fine. An application was also submitted for condoning an inordinate delay of 847 days in filing the revision plea. 

The ground taken in the application was that the impugned judgment was passed in July 2017 by the appellate court in his absence as he was mentally upset & could not enquire about the case from his counsel. However, his family kept on depositing the due amount. The applicant-petitioner, under depression & tension, thought that his case had been closed. He came to know about the impugned judgment only when police officials arrested him on Feb 1, the Bench was told.

Justice Jain observed, “The plea of applicant-petitioner qua his mental tension & depression is apparently incorrect in the absence of any medical prescription or certificate in this regard. Be that as it may, by this time, it is well settled that a litigant has to be vigilant throughout, till any legal proceeding initiated by him or against him is concluded. Thus, it was bounden duty of the applicant-petitioner to remain in touch with his counsel to pursue his case.”

The Judge added that reason had not been explained for absence of efforts to ask the lawyer about the fate of his case for a long duration.

Dismissing the plea, Justice Jain added that each day’s delay was required to be explained in a mathematical manner, but the plea taken by the petitioner-applicant was completely vague, false & unreliable. As such, the Court wasn't inclined to condone the inordinate delay of 847 days in filing instant revision.

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