Government departments are under a special obligation to ensure diligent and committed performance of their duties, and condonation of delay should not be used as an anticipated benefit for government departments.

JUDGMENT

Vibhu Bakhru, J.

CM APPL. 3432/2020

1. The respondent is stated to be seventy-three years old. He had filed the first petition, WP (C) 6663/2010, which was disposed of on 19.09.2011. The respondent had filed the second petition, W.P.(C) 5855/2013, as according him the appellant had denied the complete benefit of the order dated 19.09.2011. This petition was disposed of by the order dated 22.01.2019, which the appellant seeks to impugn in the above captioned appeal.

2. The appellant has filed the present application seeking condonation of delay of 279 days in filing the present appeal.

3. The appellant had filed a application (being CM No.53023/2019) seeking similar relief but the same was bereft of any particulars. The said application was listed on 10.12.2019 and this Court had passed the following order:

"1. The present appeal has been filed by the DDA assailing the judgment dated 22.1.2019, passed by the learned Single Judge, allowing a writ petition filed by the respondent claiming entitlement to allotment of a flat under the New Pattern Registration Scheme, 1979, on pre-existing priority number.

2. The appeal is accompanied by an application seeking condonation of delay of 279 days. Having perused the averments made in the application, we are of the view that the same are extremely flimsy and the appellant/DDA does not deserve any indulgence.

3. Mr. Rajiv Bansal, learned Senior Advocate appearing for the appellant/DDA states that DDA may be permitted to file a better affidavit in support of the condonation of delay application.

4. As and when such an application is filed, the same shall be considered in accordance with law.

5. List on 28.1.2020."

4. On the next date of hearing, that is, on 28.01.2020, the learned counsel appearing for appellant withdrew the earlier application (CM No.53023/2019) as the appellant had filed the present application. None was present on behalf of the respondent on the said date and the matter was accordingly, deferred to 31.03.2020. However, thereafter, the functioning of the Court was disrupted for a considerable period of time due to the outbreak of Covid-19.

5. The present appeal was, thereafter, listed on 24.02.2022. Since none was present on behalf of the respondent, the hearing of the petition was deferred. It was listed a few times thereafter but the hearing was adjourned either on the request made by the counsel or on account of paucity of time.

6. The application filed by the appellant sets out the reasons that occasioned the delay in filing the present appeal. The applicant/appellant states that immediately after receiving the impugned order dated 22.01.2019, steps were taken to process the file to put up before the competent authority. The file was put up before the competent authority through the Senior Law Officer (Housing) on 07.02.2019. The appellant then decided to place the same before its Appeal Committee. This court is informed that the appellant has constituted the Appeal Committee to decide whether an appeal is required to be filed.

7. A meeting of the Appeal Committee was held on 13.02.2019 and the Appeal Committee decided to accept the impugned order and not file any appeal against the said decision. The minutes of the said meeting held on 13.02.2019 were signed on 08.03.2019.

8. It is explained that thereafter, the file was sent to the Accounts Branch but certain queries were raised by the Accounts Branch and the file moved from desk to desk. However, when the file was put up before the Commissioner (Housing) on 14.06.2019, he decided that an appeal must be preferred notwithstanding the earlier decision of the Appeal Committee to accept the impugned order.

9. Thereafter, the matter proceeded at a leisurely pace. A separate meeting was convened on 20.06.2019 for discussing the issues, which was postponed to 28.06.2019 due to non-availability of members. It was once again re-scheduled for 05.07.2019 for administrative reasons. It was not held on 05.07.2019 eit