ORDER
A.S. Anand, C.J.
1. The State of Jammu and Kashmir and the competent authority have applied for review of my judgment in writ petition titled Farooq Ahmed Bachha v. State of J. & K, delivered on 21-11-1988, on a reference made by the two brother Judges of the Court constituting the Division Bench.
2. The power to review its judgment other than those under the procedural laws is available to the High Court only under the Jammu and Kashmir High Court Rules, 1975. The relevant provision is Rule 51. Sub-rule (i) of Rule 51 of the said Rules, provides that the Court may review its judgment or order but that no application for review shall be entertained except on the grounds mentioned in O. XLVII, Rule 1, C.P.C. Sub-rule (39) of R. 51 provides:
“An application for review shall be accompanied by a certified copy of the impugned judgment or order and of the decree, if necessary, with two spare copies thereof, and when the application proceeds on grounds of discovery of fresh evidence, certified copies of the documents, if any, relied upon with two spare copies thereof shall be annexed with the application together with an affidavit setting forth the circumstances under which such discovery has been made.”
And Sub-rule (4) provides :
“An application for review shall be filed before the Deputy Register within thirty days after the judgment is delivered in the appeal, cause or matter unless” the Court for sufficient cause condones the delay beyond 30 days.”
3. It is, thus, obvious that there is a mandatory requirement that an application for review shall be accompanied by a certified copy of the impugned judgment or order with two spare copies thereof and that it shall be filed within 30 days after the judgment is delivered in the appeal, cause or matter, unless the Court, for sufficient cause, condones the delay beyond 30 days.
4. The present review petition is not accompanied by any certified copy of the judgment sought to be reviewed. An un-attested photostat copy of the judgment has been placed on record. No photostat copies have, however, been attached with the two spare copies of the memorandum of petition. Thus, the review petition has not been presented in accordance with the mandatory requirements of Sub-rule (3) of Rule 51, which is fatal.
5. Mr. B. A. Khan did not dispute that Rule 51(3) is mandatory in character but submitted that the petitioners have filed an application (C.M.P. No. 247 of 1998) seeking exemption from filing a certified copy of the judgment dated 21-11-1988 and that the petitioners would file a copy of the judgment as soon as it is available, the same having already been applied for and that the grant of exemption would remove the ‘fatal’ defect.
6. The application (C.M.P. No. 247 of 1989) seeking exemption from filing a certified copy of the judgment filed on 17-1-1989, however, is not supported by any affidavit. Moreover, in para 1 of the application, it is stated:
“That the petitioners had obtained one certified copy of thejudgment of the Hon’ble Third Judge dated 21-11-1989 which has been appended with the petition for leave to appeal. However, the petitioners have appended a photostat copy of the certified copy of the judgment along with the petition.”
On this application the registry had made a note on 17-1-1989 to the effect that no application seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court had been filed till then. The note, thus, shows that the averment made in para 1 of the application, as noticed above, is factually incorrect and the petitioners have tried to mislead the Court which is highly objectionable. I not only view this conduct with utmost concern but also strongly disapprove it.
7. On the short ground that the application (C.M.P. No. 247/89) which is not accompanied by any affidavit and contains factual misstatement, merits rejection, even on merits, the position is not different. Rule 51 (supra) enables the Court on sufficient cause being shown to condone delay but there is no provision which authorises the Court to exempt a party seeking review from furnishing a certified copy of the judgment under review. The application for exemption from filing certified copy is, therefore, under no provision of rules, under which alone the review petition lies. Thus considered from any angle, the application seeking exemption from filing the certified copy of the judgment merits rejection and is dismissed as such. With the rejection of the application, the review petition reverts to the position that it does not comply with the provisions of Rule 51(3) and there being non-compliance with the mandatory requirements of the Rule, the review petition is held to be suffering from the fatal defect of presentation. Since, the Rule requires the filing of the certified copy, the ‘unattested’ photostat copy, filed with the petition is no substitute because where the law requires a particular thing to be done in a particular manner, it has to be done in that manner and in no other manner.
8. Apart from the non-compliance with Sub-rule (3) of Rule 51 (supra), the review petition has not been filed within the prescribed period of 30 days from the date of the judgment as required by Sub-rule (4) of Rule 51 (supra). The judgment, as already noticed, was delivered on 21-11-1988, The review petition was filed on 17-1-1989, much beyond the expiry of the period of 30 days. Neither in the memorandum of the review petition nor through any separate application, have the petitioners sought condonation of delay in filing the petition or explained the existence of any sufficient cause for condoning the delay beyond the period of 30 days. The submission of Mr. Khan, however, was that an application for obtaining a certified copy of the judgment had been filed on 21-11-1988 itself and the certified copy of the judgment was ready on 19-12-1988 and, therefore, the petitioners were entitled to be granted the time spent by them for obtaining the certified copy of the judgment. The argument would have merited consideration had the certified copy of the judgment been filed with the review petition, but that, as already noticed, is not the position in the present case. That certified copy has not been filed with the petition and, therefore, the argument is not available to the petitioners. There is yet another aspect also which exposes the negligence of the petitioners and disentitled them to any indulgence. From the photostat copy of the judgment it appears that the copy of the judgment was available with the petitioners on 19-12-1988 i.e., before the period of 30 days had expired. There was thus no justification for the petitioners not to prefer the petition within the period prescribed and append that certified copy with it as the period to file the review petition had still not expired. According to Mr. B. A. Khan, the petitioner appended the certified copy of the judgment with the application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court. The period for filing an application for seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court is 90 days, that is, sixty days more than the prescribed period for filing the review petition. The petitioners cannot, therefore, be heard to say that since they intended to append the available certified copy along with the application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court, yet to be filed, the period spent by them in obtaining a copy of the judgment attached with the LASC, be given credit for and delay condoned to entertain the review petition. The argument is illogical. It is only in the case in which a copy is filed that the time spent for obtaining the copy may be given credit and not otherwise. The petitioners obviously have been grossly negligent in pursuing the remedy of review and lack of due care and caution itself, is sufficient to reject the plea for condonation of delay in filing the review petition. Petitioners should have been vigilant in pursuing the matter and a heavy burden is cast upon them when they seek extension to establish that they had acted diligently. The established facts of the case prove to the contrary. The review petition under Rule 51(4) (supra) was required to be filed within 30 days. For the purpose of prescribing the period of limitation the High Court Rules have been held to special law as vide a Division Bench judgment of this Court in State v. G. S. Baroca, AIR 1978 J & K 64. Under the Limitation Act, it is obligation of the Court to dismiss a petition which is barred by limitation unless the Court on being satisfied about the existence of sufficient cause, condones the delay in filing the petition. Nothing has been brought on record to show the existence of any sufficient cause for condoning the delay in the present case. The review petition is, thus, hopelessly time barred and the petitioners have failed to establish the existence of any sufficient cause to seek condonation of delay.
9. Thus, both for non-compliance with Rule 51(3) and since the review petition has been filed beyond the period prescribed by Rule 51(4), the petition merits rejection.
10. That part, I find that the petition, which runs into 12 pages, seeks the review of the judgment dated 21-11-1988 on certain grounds contained in the memorandum of the petition. Coming to the facts, exception has been taken to certain findings recorded by me as well as to the applicability of certain earlier judgments by me to support those findings and these are sought to be reinforced by reference to some other judgments. The question is: what is the scope of a review petition?
11. A Full Bench of this Court in Ghulam Hussain v. Ghulam Qadir, 1979 Kash LJ 91 : (AIR 1978 J & K 88), has held that a review petition has quite a limited purpose and it is not an appeal in disguise and is permissible only in exceptional cases which come within the ambit of Order XLV1I, Rule 1, C.P.C. A bare reading of the memorandum of the petition and particularly various sub-paragraphs of para 6, show that it is an attempt on the part of the petitioners to point out some alleged errors. The submissions made in various sub-paragraphs of para 6, however, do not constitute any error apparent on the face of the record and the alleged errors which the petitioners seek to get corrected by review, apparently require to be detected by long drawn process of reasoning, reappraisal of material on the record and lengthy arguments by reference to some other judgments. Such errors, as held by the Full Bench in 1979 Kash LJ 91 : (AIR 1978 J & K 88), can hardly be said to be errors apparent on the face of the record. In Thungbhadara Industries Ltd. v. Govt. of Andhra Pradesh, AIR 1964 C 1372, their Lordships of Supreme Court, while considering the scope of a review petition, observed as follows (Para 11):
“A review is by no means an appeal in disguise whereby an erroneous decision is reheard and corrected but lies only for a patent error, where without any elaborate argument one could point to the error and say there is a substantial point of law which stares one in the face, and there could reasonably be no two opinions entertained about it, a clear case or error apparent on the face of the record would be made out.”
12. The position in the instant case, on the basis of the grounds detailed in the memorandum of review petition, is entirely different becausee the effort on the part of the petitioners is not to point out any patent error but to have the entire case reopened, reappraised and corrected. The power of review granted to the Court on the principles of Order XLVII, Rule 1, C.P.C. has alimited purpose and the Court would be transgressing its power if it proceeds to enlarge the scope by interfering with an allegedly earlier erroneous order by reopening and reappraising the entire case which the petitioners, in effect, seeking. That is not the scope of a review petition.
13. It is the admitted case of the petitioners that a petition for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court against the judgment under review, filed after the present application, is also pending disposal in this Court and that also supports the view that the present review petition, is in fact, an appeal in disguise and hence the same cannot be entertained.
14. Thus, for what has been said above, the review petition fails and is dismissed as such.