The central legal point established in the judgment is that 'reasonable cause' for non-disclosure of documents must be established, and 'sheer inadvertence' or 'oversight' would not constitute 'reasonable cause' for granting leave under Rule 10 of Order 11 of CPC as applicable to Commercial Suits.

JUDGMENT:

1. Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. With consent of the Parties, Petition is taken up for final hearing.

2. This Petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India takes exception to, the order dated 13th July, 2022, by which the learned Judge, City Civil Court, Greater Bombay refused leave, sought by the petitioners-defendants, to rely on the documents, which were not filed along with the Written Statement, in the Commercial Suit No.274 of 2019 instituted by the respondents.

3. Facts in brief are as under:

Respondents/Plaintiff instituted Commercial Suit No.274 of 2019 in the City Civil Court, Bombay, against the petitioners-defendants, to recover the sum of Rs.83,66,242/- together with interest @ 14% p.a. Suit was instituted, on 14th November, 2019. For the sake of brevity, hereinafter, petitioners and the respondents shall be referred as per their original nomenclature as defendants and plaintiffs respectively. It is plaintiffs case that since 1977, defendants/bank had sanctioned and granted working capital facility. It was renewed, over the years upon plaintiffs executing necessary security documents required for utilisation of facility. Plaintiffs’ case is that the defendants have made unauthorised; (I) excess debit on the L/C charges for the period from September, 2008 till December, 2010; (ii) excess debit of 3% p.a. by charging higher rate of interest from September, 2008 till December, 2010; (iii) charged unauthorised and recovered excess processing fees. As such the plaintiffs were constrained to institute the suit to recover the amount of Rs.83,66,242.50 paise which were illegally debited and recovered by the defendants from the plaintiffs.

4. Defendants filed Written Statement on 13th February, 2020 and relied on following documents;

(I) Risk based internal audit report;

(ii) Statement of account of the plaintiffs’ cash-credit account;

(iii) Letter dated 23rd February, 2021 addressed by the defendant to the plaintiff;

(iv) Letter dated 9th April, 2021 addressed by the plaintiff to the defendant;

(v) Letter dated 23rd April, 2021 addressed to the defendant by the plaintiff;

(vi) Any other relevant documents correspondence with permission of the Court.

5. Thereafter on 5th April, 2021, plaintiffs filed affidavit of evidence of Mr. Chetan A. Jain, Director, which was marked Exhibit 34 on 3rd February, 2022.

6. Mr. Jain was cross-examined by the defendants on, 22nd February, 2022, 24th February, 2022, 2nd March, 2022 and cross-examination was complete on 4th March, 2022. Thereafter, defendants filed their, affidavit of evidence, on 23rd March, 2022 and sought to produce twelve documents, as per list annexed thereto.

7. As such, after cross examination of Plaintiffs’ witness, on 5th April, 2022, defendants took out Notice of Motion No.1337 of 2022, seeking leave of the Court to rely and produce documents, as per the list, filed along affidavit of evidence.

8. Defendants would contend that documents, viz., (i) statement of cash credit account maintained at the Ankleshwar Branch; (ii) Statement of cash-credit account maintained at Dulalwadi Branch, Bombay; and (iii) certificates under Bankers’ Book Evidence Act, (iv) acknowledgment of debt, (v) Boards Resolution were not filed due to ‘oversight’. Defendants would further contend that since plaintiffs have, disputed debit entries in these two accounts, no prejudice will be caused to the plaintiffs, if the leave is granted to produce statements of cash credit accounts and the certificates under the Bankers’ Book Evidence Act. Defendants would also contend that plaintiffs’ witness, Mr. Jain, since, admitted execution of various documents in favour of the bank for availing credit facilities, no prejudice will, cause to the plaintiffs if leave is granted to produce acknowledgment of debt executed by the plaintiffs and the board’s resolution. It was, therefore, urged that in the interest of justice defendant Bank may be permitted to rely and produce documents, list of whi