JUDGMENT
M.B. Sharma, J.
1. With the consent of the parties I proceed to dispose of this writ petition.
2. The petitioner Hanja is the wife of Shanker Singh and other petitioners are sons and daughter of Shanker Singh who died out of use of a motor vehicle in an accident which took place on 21.5.1984. A claim petition under Section 110-A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939 (for short ‘the Act’) was filed by the petitioners herein in the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Ajmer, on 30.10.1984, within six months, the period of limitation prescribed under the Act. In the said claim petition the petitioners had arrayed Jaipur Golden Transport Co. as respondent being the owner of truck No. RRG 4655. In the reply to the said claim petition filed by the Jaipur Golden Transport Co., the said company came out with a case that it was not the registered owner of the vehicle and as such it was not liable to pay any amount. The petitioners thereafter made an enquiry and they are said to have inspected the record of the case in the court of the learned Magistrate where a charge-sheet has been filed and on enquiry they came to know that one Harnam Das Bhatia was the registered owner of the vehicle and the New India Assurance Co. Ltd. was its insurer. An application was filed on behalf of the petitioners in the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal on 28.3.1985, under Order 6, Rule 17 read with Order 1, Rule 10, Civil Procedure Code, wherein it was prayed that it was under the bona fide mistake that in the original claim petition Jaipur Golden Transport Co. was shown as the owner of the above truck. It was prayed that now Harnam Das Bhatia, the registered owner of the truck and the New India Assurance Co. Ltd., its insurer, may be arrayed as respondents. The application was contested on behalf of both the parties who were sought to be added and the learned Tribunal under its order dated 16.5.1985 allowed the application in part insofar as the New India Assurance Co. Ltd. is concerned, but dismissed the application for impleading Harnam Das Bhatia as respondent on the ground that it will amount to addition of the parties beyond the period of limitation and the claim against that party had become time-barred.
3. It was contended by the learned counsel for the petitioners that the learned Member of the Tribunal has committed an illegality and at least impropriety in dismissing the application insofar as Harnam Das Bhatia is concerned as the claim petition was filed within the time prescribed under the Act and it was by a bona fide mistake that the name of the vehicle owner came to be mentioned in the original claim petition as Jaipur Golden Transport Co. and the said mistake occurred due to the fact that on the body of the truck ‘Jaipur Golden Transport Company’ was written. It was on enquiry made after the written statement was filed by Jaipur Golden Transport Co. that the petitioners came to know about the real owner of the vehicle.
4. A perusal of the proviso to Sub-section (3) of Section 110-A of the Act will show that power has been conferred on the Tribunal to entertain an application after the expiry of the period of limitation if it is satisfied that the applicant was prevented by sufficient cause from making the application in time. It will be seen from the application (pages 19 and 20 of the paperbook) which has been filed on behalf of the petitioners before the learned Tribunal under Order 6, Rule 17 read with Order 1, Rule 10 and Section 151, Civil Procedure Code, that the petitioners had come out with the specific case that they were not knowing and had no knowledge that Harnam Das Bhatia was the owner of the truck and it was only when the reply was filed that they came to know that Jaipur Golden Transport Co. was not the owner of the truck but on enquiry it was revealed that one Harnam Das Bhatia was the owner of the vehicle and the New India Assurance Co. Ltd. was the insurer. Learned Tribunal has itself referred to these facts in its order and has said that even Harnam Das Bhatia had admitted in the court of Magistrate that he was the owner of the vehicle and his address was Jaipur Golden Transport Co. In my opinion, sufficient facts were contained in the said application and as such it was a fit case in which the learned Member of the Tribunal in exercise of his powers under the proviso to Sub-section (3) of Section 110-A of the Act should have entertained the application even after the expiry of the period of six months as it was a case where it can be said that the petitioners were prevented by sufficient cause from making the application. That apart, even assuming that the petitioners have made an application for substitution of Jaipur Golden Transport Co. by Harnam Das Bhatia and the application had been filed after the period of six months, under the provisions to Sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Limitation Act if the court is satisfied that the omission to include a new plaintiff or defendant was due to mistake made in good faith it may direct that the suit as regards such plaintiff or defendant shall be deemed to have been instituted on any earlier date. Therefore, by virtue of Section 21(1) of the Limitation Act after the institution of a suit, a new plaintiff or defendant is substituted or added, the suit shall, as regards him, be deemed to have been instituted when he was so made a party, but the court has power under the proviso to Sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Limitation Act and it can order that the suit as regards such plaintiff or defendant shall be deemed to have been instituted on any earlier date, if it is satisfied that the omission to include the new plaintiff or defendant was due to mistake made in good faith. It was a fit case where the court should have ordered that the claim petition as against Harnam Das Bhatia shall be deemed to have been instituted when the original claim petition was filed, which, as said earlier, was filed within the prescribed period of limitation.
5. In the case of Mohd. Sabir v. Sahajibai 1993 ACJ 558 (MP), a learned Judge of the Madhya Pradesh High Court was dealing with a case where the claimants came to know of the owner from the copy of the policy filed by the insurance company and immediately thereafter they took steps to implead the owner-insured. The Tribunal had found that the claimants were prevented by sufficient cause from adding the name of the owner-insured as a party in time and condoned the delay. It was held that the standard laid down in Section 5 of the Limitation Act is not applicable and sufficient cause is a question of fact and not law. In the case of Basappa v. K.H. Sreenivasa Reddy 1982 ACJ (Supp) 585 (Kamataka), a Division Bench of the Kamataka High Court in para 20 said:
Limitation is prescribed for instituting a petition. When once the petition is instituted in time with some of the relevant parties, addition of necessary parties could be made later. Besides, under the Rules, it is the duty of the Tribunal to add and issue notices to necessary parties.
In para 22 of the aforesaid case the court referred to the proviso to Sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Limitation Act and said that under the said proviso the court has power to direct that the suit as regards newly added defendants shall be deemed to have been instituted on an earlier date within time.
6. I am, therefore, of the opinion that in a claim petition under Section 110-A of the Act the Tribunal has power to entertain the. application for substitution of a new party even beyond the period of limitation prescribed for the purposes if it is satisfied that the applicant was prevented by sufficient cause from making the application within time and the court has also power to order that the said newly added person shall be deemed to have been arrayed from the date the claim petition was filed.
7. Consequently, I hereby allow this claim petition and set aside that part of the order of the learned Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Ajmer, dated 16.5,1985, whereby the application of the petitioners for impleading Harnam Das Bhatia as one of the respondents was dismissed. The application of the petitioners for impleading Harnam Das Bhatia as one of the respondents in the claim petition is allowed. The Tribunal will now proceed further in accordance with law. Costs made easy.