Litigant Shifting Responsibility For Inordinate Delay To Counsel's Negligence Is 'Unwholesome': Delhi High Court
While hearing a writ petition moved after a delay of six years, the Delhi High Court deprecated the practice of litigants seeking condonation of delay merely on the ground that their counsel was negligent or indolent.
In doing so the court underscored that a litigant's responsibility of keeping track of their case does not go away once a counsel is engaged.
A division bench of Justice C. Hari Shankar and Justice Anoop Kumar Mendiratta remarked, “We also disapprove the unwholesome practice of seeking to explain away inordinate delay and laches on approaching the Court on the mere ground that the Counsel who had been dealing with, or entrusted, the matter, was tardy, negligent, or indolent.”
It further remarked, “We emphatically disapprove of this practice of shifting, to the shoulders of the Counsel, the negligence in approaching the Court. It is easy, in such circumstances, to file a complaint before the Bar Council and seek to explain away the delay. We deprecate this. A litigant does not abandon all responsibility to keep track of a matter, once it is entrusted to Counsel.”
The Court was considering the petitioner's request for condonation of 6-year delay in filing the writ petition.
In his petition, the petitioner stated that he engaged a counsel practising in District Court, Gurgaon. The petitioner claimed that the counsel misled him by giving fake dates and filing incomplete documents. It was stated that he found out that no case was filed before the High Court and in view of the circumstances, he sought condonation of delay in approaching the High Court.
The High Court referred to Mrinmoy Maity vs. Chhanda Koley & Ors. (2024 LiveLaw (SC) 318), where the Supreme Court observed that the High Court ought not to grant relief under Article 226 of the Constitution if the petitioner approaches the court belatedly or sleeps over their rights for a considerable period of time.
Criticizing the litigant's shifting responsibility on their counsel for inordinate delay, the Court noted that at times such assertion is sought to be supported by the litigant approaching the Bar Council against the counsel.
If the counsel is negligent, the litigant can place convincing materials to indicate such negligence, the Court stated.
The court said that if the Counsel had been negligent, the litigant would have to place on record, "material to indicate that she, or he, has been in touch with the Counsel during the entire period of delay, and that the Counsel has been misleading her, or him".
It further underscored that this material must be acceptable, and convincing.
It further said, “The Court has to be satisfied that, in fact, the Counsel has been misleading the client, and that this explains the entire period of delay in approaching the Court. Of course, if the Court is so satisfied, and an innocent litigant has been led up the garden path by an unscrupulous Counsel, the court would not allow injustice to be done, and would, in an appropriate case, condone the delay.”
Here, the Court said that the petitioner's explanation was not satisfactory to explain the 6-year delay in approaching it.
The Court thus dismissed the petition.
Case title: Rahul Mavai vs. Union Of India & Ors (W.P.(C) 17440/2024)
Click Here To Read/Download Order