The State machineries are bound to come out from such lethargic attitude in the matter of Court proceedings and that the Law Department including some of the learned advocates appointed to look after the cases on behalf of the Government are not functioning properly.

Heard Ms. Chaitali Bhattacharya, Learned Advocate for the appellant, the State of West Bengal preferring the appeal being MAT 2062 of 2014 which is accompanied with CAN No. 11563 of 2014 under Section 5 of the Limitation Act, 1963 for condonation of delay along with another application being CAN No. 11564 of 2014 for staying operation of the order dated 14th December, 2012 passed by learned Trial Judge in W.P. No. 5142(W) of 2011 (State of West Bengal & Ors. v. Borjora Ashar Alo & Ors.) Ms. Bhattacharya, submitted that delay in preferring the appeal should be condoned otherwise the State would suffer irreparable loss and injury since the delay as taken place was beyond control. She further submitted that since before preferring the appeal the file would have to move to different tables and ultimately without the approval of the Legal Remembrancer, the appeal would not be preferred, the delay, as took place, should be condoned leniently.

2. On taking justice oriented approach instead of asking the State to explain the delay on day to day basis, Ms. Bhattacharya relied upon the following cases:-

1. State of Assam & Ors. v. Susrita Holdings Pvt. Ltd. AIR (2014) 3 Supreme Court 2307

2. (2014) 14 Supreme Court Cases 133.

3. Mr. Mahapatra, learned Advocate for the respondent, opposing the application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act submitted that the application suffered from vagueness, and, save and except putting some dates in the application the delay was not explained and therefore the appeal is hopelessly time barred and the application under Section 5 should be rejected. Our attention was also drawn to the observations of the Supreme Court in the case of Post Master General and Others v. Living Media India Limited and Another reported in (2012) 3 Supreme Court Cases 563.

4. We have gone through the decisions cited at the Bar. It is redundant to say, as we have noticed during day to day Court's proceedings that pendency of cases or appeals by or against the State or the several wings of the State are in a bulk. But any appeal with applications are presented before the Court on behalf of the State usually much after the stipulated period of limitation, although there is well set machinery headed by the Principle Secretary, Law and the Legal Remembrancer with the set of other Officers and dealing assistants to look after specially on the Court's proceedings including appointment of Advocate to sue or be sued on behalf of the Government.

5. It is also the bounden duty of the learned Advocates deputed by the Government to look after the concerned case, to participate in the hearing and also obviously to communicate instantly the order of the Court immediately to the department so that the department may be aware of the result of the proceeding and to take further steps if any would be required.

6. Plea is taken before us that as a matter of practise concerned Government advocate even is not in a position to take steps for applying certified copy of the order impugned until approval is coming from the Legal Remembrancer. The plea is neither plausible nor acceptable since after the final order being signed by the learned Trial Judge it would come in the server wherefrom anybody can download. We could not be apprised of with any explanation as to when the order under challenge was delivered on 14th December, 2012 then why it was not communicated to the state promptly by the learned deputed Advocate. It is also matter of practise that upon submission at the Bar and taking note of exigency the appellant is denied by the Court to file appeal even without certified copy or simply by accompanying server copy on an usual undertaking that certified copy would be attached later on.

7. It is obvious that offering explanation for condonation of delay or its consideration by the Court is within the provision laid down under Section 5 of the Limitation Act, 1963 which is set out as follows :-

Extension of prescribed period in certain cases