JUDGMENT
J.P. Singh, J.
1. Four hundred sixty five days’ delay in filing restoration applicats/beon, seeking restoration of Civil Second Appeal No. 26/2003 dismissed in default of appearance and for non-prosecution on 19.12.2003, is sought to be condoned by the applicant.
2. The ground urged in support of the application is that applicant is an old man who could not know about the listing of the appeal and order passed therein on 19.12.2003 for pretty long time. The applicant adds that the case was to be listed in the Court after the service of the respondents. He submits that he came to know about the dismissal of the appeal for non-prosecution through respondent i.e. Station Headquarters, Udhampur, on 12.04.2005.
3. Respondents object the condonation of delay on the ground that the applicant has not explained the delay in filing the application and the plea raised by the applicant is misconceived as he does not appear to have made any effort to know the fate of his case.
4. Learned Counsel for the respondents submits that the applicant has taken a false plea to maintain his application, which is even otherwise not based on facts. According to learned Counsel, there is a concurrent finding of two Subordinate Courts against the applicant and the present application is an attempt of the applicant to prolong the litigation. He submits that the dismissal of appeal one and a half years before the date of filing of the present application and in the meantime applicant’s not taking any action in seeking restoration, is by itself a circumstance, which disentitles the applicant to maintain his application. According to learned Counsel, a litigant cannot sleep over the litigation and in case he does so, he cannot take benefit of his own wrong. Learned Counsel has cited P.K. Ramachandran v. State of Kerala and Anr. reported as ; The State of West Bengal v. The Administrator, Howrah Municipality and Ors. etc. reported as ; and Shyam Lal Dhar v. Ply Board Industries reported as AIR 1981 JKJ 95, to project the view that Law of Limitation has to be applied with all its rigour and delay cannot be condoned on vague, ambiguous and made out grounds.
5. Learned Counsel for the applicant, on the other hand, refers to Collector Land Acquisition, Anantnag and another v. Mst. Katiji and Ors. reported as urge that Court should adopt liberal approach.
6. I have considered the submissions of learned Counsel for the parties and gone through the judgments cited by the learned Counsel.
7. Liberal construction means expanding the meaning of the Statute to embrace cases, which are clearly within the spirit or reason of the law or within the evil, which it was designed to remedy. While interpreting a ‘Statute’ to be liberal in its application, it has to be ensured that the construction so placed on the Statute, may not be inconsistent within the language used. It is no doubt true that where a Statute vests jurisdiction in a Court to consider condonation of delay, the discretion which is required to be exercised for condonation of delay, has to be so exercised only if valid basis therefor is laid by a litigant seeking condonation of delay.
8. Condonation of delay cannot be sought as a matter of course on mere ipsidixit of an applicant. Good and sufficient reasons are required to be spelt out by an applicant who seeks exemption from the operation of Law of Limitation.
9. Application of the applicant is vague and ambiguous. It is shorn off requisite facts, which may be said to lay basis for projecting any justifiable cause for condonation of delay. The application is singularly silent as to the events which took place in this gap of one and a half year between the applicant and his counsel. Affidavit of learned Counsel, who had been appearing on behalf of the appellant, too does not accompany the application Affidavit in support of the application does not spell out any reason on the basis whereof claim of the applicant for condonation of delay may be considered.
10. Long delay of four hundred sixty five days in filing restoration application cannot, thus, be condoned on mere statement of the applicant that he could not contact his counsel and came to know about the dismissal of the appeal only from the respondents. A litigant, who sleeps over his rights and does not diligently follow the litigation initiated by him, is not entitled to the exercise of discretion muchless for condonation of delay.
11. This application is, thus, without any force and is rejected.