The provisions of Rule 10A of Order 22 of the Civil Procedure Code are procedural and the Court can condone the delay in filing an application for bringing the legal representative on record after the expiry of the limitation period if the applicant can show sufficient cause for the delay.

1. - Provisions contained in Rule 10AORDER1 of the Civil Procedure Code, have been introduced specifically to mitigate the hardship arising from the fact that the party to a proceeding may not come to know about the death of the other party during the pendency of the proceeding when it is awaiting its turn for being heard. This duty is cast upon the Advocate appearing for the party who comes to know about the death of the party to intimate to the Court about the death of the party represented by him and for this purpose a deeming fiction is introduced that the contract between dead client and lawyer subsists to the limited extent after the death of the client. Rule 10-A was inserted by Civil Procedure Code (Amendment) Act, 1976 to impose an obligation on the pleader of the parties to communicate to the Court the death of the party represented by him.

2. What is the effect of non-compliance of Rule 10-A ? Whether the provisions of Rule 10-A are procedural ? These legal questions are to be examined in this revision which arises from the order dated April 25, 1994 and March 23, 1990 respectively passed by the lower appellate Court and the trial Court whereby the application filed by the plaintiff petitioner Sooka Lal (since dead and represented through L.R.'s) under Order 22 Rules 4 and 9, Civil Procedure Code was rejected.

3. The facts that lie in a short compass are that plaintiff petitioner Sooka Lal (for short plaintiff instituted a suit for permanent injunction against Jeewan and Radhey Shyam. During the pendency of the suit Jeewan expired on December 15, 1987. The plaintiff moved application under Order 22 Rules 4 and 9, CPC, alongwith an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act on July 27, 1988 for setting aside abatement of the suit and for bringing on record the legal representative of the deceased Jeewan. In the application it was stated that the plaintiff was an old person and his sons Krishna Nand who was to look after the cases, had been transferred from Karauli and was re-transferred on July 23, 1988. Thereafter he went to Gangapur City and when asked the Counsel about the progress of the case, he was informed by the Counsel that application for bringing on record the legal representative of deceased Jeewan had to be filed. After making inquiry about the legal representative of deceased Jeewan, application was filed on July 27, 1988. It was also stated that the plaintiff had no knowledge that application had to be filed within 90 days. Plaintiff also submitted his affidavit in support of the application. The defendant contested the application refuted its contents and stated in reply that son of plaintiff was a clerk in Sub-Divisional office as such he was expected to have knowledge of the period of limitation. As the application was barred by limitation it could not have been accepted.

4. The trial Court dismissed the application. The plaintiff preferred appeal but the appeal was also dismissed as stayed herein above.

5. I have given my thoughtful consideration to the rival contentions and perused the impugned orders.

6. To appreciate the point involved, it is necessary to refer the provision of Rule 10AORDER22, Civil Procedure Code which reads as under :

"Wherever, a pleader appearing for a party to the suit comes to know of the death of that party, lie shall inform the Court about it, and the Court shall thereupon give notice of such death to the other party, and for this purpose, the contract between the pleader and the deceased party shall be deemed to subsist."

(Emphasis supplied)A cursory look at the provision reveals that it is the duty of the Counsel of a defendant to the suit to intimate the Court about the death of the defendant and the Court has to give intimation of the death to the plaintiff so that the plaintiff could take expeditious steps to bring the legal representatives on record.

7. Indisputedly the procedure was not followed in the instant case. Both the Courts below have passed the