Advocates Shouldn't Advise Clients To Reagitate Matters If There Is No Error Apparent On Face Of Record: Allahabad High Court

In a significant remark, the Allahabad High Court has said that an advocate should not give such a piece of advice when there is no error apparent on the face of the record nor was there any other reason why the matter be re-agitated after it was finally decided.

The Bench of Justice Dr. Kaushal Jayendra Thaker and Justice Vivek Varma observed thus while dealing with a civil review application wherein the advocate concerned advised his client to take a chance by filing the instant review application after a period of six years.

In the instant matter, a civil review application was filed along with an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act, 1963 seeking condonation of delay in filing the application, which was filed with a delay of 1900 days i.e. about six years

The applicants stated that they could not file the review application within time due to the blockage of public transportation on account of COVID-19 guidelines.

However, the Court was of the view that the appeals were disposed of by the Apex Court in the year 2016 and the pandemic struck India only in 2020-2021, and therefore, it cannot be said that due to the COVID guidelines the public transportation was blocked, and therefore, the applicants could not come to Allahabad to file the review.

Further, when the Court asked the counsel for the review applicants to explain the delay in filing the review application, to which he gave a strange reply that he advised his clients that they may take a chance by filing this review application after a period of six years.

To this, the Court observed thus:

"We are pained to note that an advocate should not give such an advise when there is no error apparent on the face of record nor was there any other reason that why the matter be re-agitated after it was finally decided."

Further, the Court opined that there was no reason to condone the delay of six years as the same was not explained as to why this review application is filed after such an inordinate delay.

"Lapse on the part of litigant in approaching Court within time is understandable but a total inaction for long period of delay without any explanation whatsoever and that too in absence of showing any sincere attempt on the part of suiter, would add to his negligence, and would be relevant factor going against him," the Court opined.

Consequently, the Court observed that the review applicants had been careless and reckless in approaching the court and therefore, the Court dismissed the delay condonation application with a token cost of Rs.10,000/.

Case title - Malhan And 17 Others Vs. State Of U.P. And Another [CIVIL MISC REVIEW APPLICATION No. - 22 of 2022]

Citation: 2022 LiveLaw (AB) 302

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