1. Heard the learned Advocates for the respective parties.

2. Rule.

3. By consent, Rule is made returnable forthwith and the petition is taken up for final disposal.

4. The petitioner/establishment is aggrieved by the order dated 18.12.2017, by which, the trial Court has allowed application Exhibit 33 and permitted the respondent/Municipal Corporation to file it's written statement by imposing costs of Rs.5,000/-.

5. Learned counsel for the petitioner has strenuously criticized the impugned order. His contentions can be summarised as under:

(a) The trial Court has committed a gross error in recalling it's no Written Statement order.

(b) Order VIII Rule 1 of the Civil Procedure Code (CPC) has been misinterpreted.

(c) Lack of due diligence on the part of the respondent, has been lost sight of.

(d) The stage in the matter was for advancing final arguments and yet the 'No written statement' order is recalled.

(e) The delay caused by the respondent is not properly explained.

(f) The respondent has deliberately caused a delay in filing the written statement.

(g) The reasons assigned for seeking vacating of the 'No written statement' order are not justifiable.

(h) Application Exhibit 33, seeking recalling of the 'No written statement' order is not maintainable.

6. Besides the above submissions based on the grounds formulated and the pleadings in the memo of the petition, it is orally submitted by the petitioner that the trial Court has agreed with the contention of the petitioner that the reasons assigned are not sufficient and yet the 'No written statement' order is recalled.

7. The issue as regards a commercial dispute is not pressed.

8. Learned counsel for the respondent has strenuously supported the impugned order. While doing so, he submits that the respondent has noticed that in some matters, where special civil suits are filed against the Corporation for seeking recovery of huge amounts ranging from more than one crore to about forty crores, written statements have not been filed though the Corporation has a panel of Advocates engaged in the Civil Courts. Such instances have been noticed by the Corporation and it is, therefore, taking steps to ensure that there would not be any recurrence of such instances.

9. He further submits that the petitioner/plaintiff has sought recovery of Rs. 39,65,37,795/- from the Corporation towards purported unpaid amounts. If no written statement is filed, the plaintiff would virtually get a walk over and would succeed in taking an amount of about Rs. Forty Crores from a public body. It is further stated that under Order VIII Rule 1 of the CPC, no doubt a litigant has to properly explain the delay. But the limit of 90 days would not be mandatory and in order to meet the ends of justice, an opportunity to file the written statement deserves to be granted.

10. Having considered the submissions of the learned Advocates for the respective sides, I find that the issue of due diligence and delay has been considered by the Honourable Apex Court in the case of Collector, Land Acquisition Anantnag and another Vs. Mst. Katiji and others [(1987) 2 SCC 107] and in the matter of Esha Bhattacharjee Vs. Managing Committee of Raghunathpur Nafar Academy and others [(2013) 12 SCC 649]. The Honourable Apex Court has laid down certain principles in the case of Esha (supra), which read as under:

"15. From the aforesaid authorities the principles that can broadly be culled out are:

(i) There should be a liberal, pragmatic, justice-oriented, non-pedantic approach while dealing with an application for condonation of delay, for the courts are not supposed to legalise injustice but are obliged to remove injustice.

(ii) The terms "sufficient cause" should be understood in their proper spirit, philosophy and purpose regard being had to the fact that these terms are basically elastic and are to be applied in proper perspective to the obtaining factsituation.

(iii) Substantial justice being paramount and pivotal the technical considerat