1.       This revision petition has been filed in challenge to the Order dated 05.01.2024  in  Appeal No. 567 of 2019  of the State Commission,  U.T. Chandigarh.      

2.       The petition has been filed with a reported delay of 194 days and admitted delay of 224 days.  As the delay does not appear to be insignificant, learned counsel appearing for the petitioners is being heard first on the delay condonation application in order to decide whether there is any good ground to condone the delay or not. 

3.       Perused the record including inter alia the delay condonation application.

4.       Learned counsel has reiterated the grounds that have been pleaded in the delay condonation application and has not added anything further to it. It has been submitted that time was taken to examine the entire record and then the matter was forwarded to legal cell and thereafter to the headquarter for filing the revision petition.  Learned counsel was engaged by the headquarter.  Time further got consumed in procuring certain documents.  Thereafter the revision petition was drafted and vetted.  All this process consumed time.  Submission is that delay being neither deliberate nor intentional the same may be condoned.

5.       First of all it may be observed that in the ordinary course whenever the aspect of evaluating the sufficiency of cause behind the delayed filing of a given petition or appeal, as the case may be, is involved, it is advisable to adopt a liberal approach and not a pedantic one.  A pragmatic view needs to be adopted as it is found preferable to decide a case on its merits rather than to thwart the same at the threshold on the point of limitation.  But while saying so, it must not be misconstrued to mean that the approach to be adopted can ever be such which may reduce the law on the point of limitation, wherever it is provided, into insignificance as if it is inconsequential and does not signify anything.  The law of limitation wherever it is provided has a salutary purpose to serve which cannot be looked down with irreverence or with indifference.  The Courts, judicial or quasi-judicial as they may be, can never afford to ride roughshod over the solemn provisions of limitation wherever they have been laid down by the Legislature in its wisdom.  It is also to be kept in perspective that the failure to file a petition against a particular order and the failure to challenge the same within the prescribed period of time, often gives rise simultaneously to a right to the other side.  This is true that if valid reasons come forth and sufficient cause is shown which may go to vindicate the delayed filing of a petition, the same may be accepted and the delay may be condoned by the given Forum.   But this discretion conferred upon any Forum, judicial or quasi-judicial as it may be, has to be exercised judiciously and in keeping with the norms.  The exercise of discretion in such matters is not the exercise of any prerogative or privilege.  It is essentially the exercise of a statutory power, granted by the Act, which has to be exercised judiciously and legally both.  While the delay of larger periods may be condoned in a given case if sufficient cause may be shown which resulted in the delay, on the other hand, a lesser period of delay may not be condoned if valid reasons showing sufficient cause are not brought forth by the defaulting party.  The onus to show and furnish the necessary factual or circumstantial basis which contributed to the delay, must be shown in order to earn the condonation and this onus is of the defaulting party who seeks such condonation.

6.       When we proceed to evaluate the sufficiency of cause, we feel constrained to observe that the grounds that have been pleaded scarcely go to furnish valid reasons which may be made the basis to absolve the huge delay involved in filing the petition.  Whenever a petition or an appeal is filed the examination of the record is a necessary process and there is nothing unusual about it.  It has to be done with alacrity and dispatch and not with such a slow pace which may lead to such protracted delay which may be found difficult to exonerate or condone.  In fact, we find that there is hardly any ground pleaded in the delay condonation application which may consutittue sufficient cause.  What is reflected from the grounds is perhaps nothing more than administrative indifference towards the law of limitation.  The things appear to have been taken for granted and petitioner department moved with its own slow pace caring little for the prescribed period of time within which the petition had to be filed.  It is true that while evaluating the sufficiency of cause, we do not adopt a pedantic approach and do not insist on day-to-day explanation of the delay.  We do keep in perspective the pragmatic side of the working of an institution, public or private sector, as it may be.  However, while saying so we certainly do not imply that in the name of being a public sector such a long rope should be expected, much less than being granted, which may lead to the shelving of the law of limitation to the extent as if it does not signify anything.  The long hiatus that separates the date when the impugned Order was passed and when the petition was filed is much too big a gap and shall require much more convincing, genuine and credible explanations than what have been pleaded.  The impugned Order was passed on 05.01.2024 while the petition was filed on 15.10.2024.     

When a petition is filed beyond the period of limitation the onus to bring forth such factual and circumstantial basis is on the defaulting petitioner on the basis of which the delay may be condoned.  In the matter at hand the Bench feels constrained to observe that the petitioner has woefully failed to discharge that onus.  The delay condonation application does not contain even a semblance of good explanation to vindicate the delayed filing.  The application does not contain much worth and does not help the petitioner at all.  Being meritless the delay condonation application stands disallowed.

7.       Concomitantly the petition stands dismissed on limitation.

8.       The Registry is requested to send a copy each of this Order to all parties in the petition and to the learned counsel for the petitioners. The stenographer is requested to upload this Order on the website of this Commission immediately.