The time requisite for obtaining a copy mentioned in Section 12 of the Indian Limitation Act is the time beyond the appellant's control occupied in obtaining the copy which accompanies the memorandum of appeal.

Madhavan Nair, J.

1. I entirely agree with the judgment which ray learned brother, Jackson, J., will presently deliver and I have nothing useful to add to it.

Jackson, J.

2. The 9th respondent takes a preliminary objection that this appeal is out of time. The date of the decree and judgment of the Lower Court is 24th February, 1927. On 1st March, 1927, the plaintiff applied for copy and obtained it after 34 days had been occupied by the copying department. He has since died, and it is not known what he did with that copy.

3. He applied again for copy on 20th April, 1927, and since the recess intervened, the time occupied by the department was 82 days. The appeal was filed on 13th August, and if this 82 days be reckoned as the time requisite for obtaining copy, the appeal is within time. But on behalf of 9th respondent it is argued that the appellant himself has demonstrated the time requisite to be only 34 days, and if that figure be taken the appeal is time-barred.

4. The time requisite for obtaining a copy of the decree mentioned in Section 12 of the Indian Limitation Act is the time beyond the applicants control occupied by the copyist department after an application for copy has been duly made. It is no concern of the Courts to ask when the application was made. A party may apply immediately the suit is decreed, or if he cares to take the risk he may wait till the 90 days period allowed him by statute is almost exhausted. Then the time requisite for obtaining a copy of the decree will be deducted, and so long as he is within his 90 days the appeal will be in time. But the respondent would have it that the applicant must discover within these 90 days at what time the copyist department can most expeditiously produce a copy, and the time requisite for obtaining a copy is this minimum period, and nothing more. Such a system would be intolerable to the parties, unworkable by the Courts, and is certainly not derived from our statutory law. For example, suppose that a suit is decreed on the 15th December, and the intending appellant applies for copy at once. He will be involved in the Christmas holidays and it may take 40 days before his copy is ready. He then takes full advantage of the 90 days allowed him by statute, and files his appeal just within 130 days, 90 plus 40. Meanwhile the other party has applied for copy for his own purposes after Christmas, and has obtained a copy in 30 days. Is he to be allowed triumphantly to exhibit this copy and plead that "the time requisite for obtaining a copy" in Section 12 of the Indian Limitation Act is 30 days, and his opponents appeal is time-barred. Obviously not: but that is precisely the argument advanced by the present respondent. It makes no difference whether the minimum time for obtaining copy has been demonstrated as in this appeal by the appellant himself, or, as in the above example, by the respondent. In neither case, is the Court concerned with the ideal minimum. The only concern of the Court is the time occupied in obtaining the copy which is filed with the appeal, not the time which might have been occupied in obtaining some other copy which is not filed with the appeal.

5. There is no case directly in point. The respondent relies strongly upon an observation of the Privy Council in J.N. Surty v. T.S. Chettyar, A Firm (1928) L.R. 55 IndAp 161 : I.L.R. 6 Rang. 302 : 54 M.L.J. 696 (P.C).

The word requisite is, a strong word ... it means properly-required and it throws upon the pleader for the appellant the necessity of showing that no part of the delay beyond the prescribed period is due to his default.

6. This affirms the rigid practice of our Courts, which insists that the only period to be deducted is that occupied by the official department: of Donepudi Subrahmanyam v. Narasimham (1920)38MLJ465 . No excuses will be heard about inability to apply, or to furnish papers, earlier than has been done. It could never be the default of the party in the example given above th