Statutory agencies must act with diligence in timely filing appeals; negligence does not justify delay in condonation requests.

JUDGMENT :

G. SATAPATHY, J.

1. The present Interlocutory Application in I.A. No. 736 of 2025 U/S.5 of the Limitation Act, 1963 has been filed by the appellant-petitioner to condone the delay of 1147 days in preferring the appeal.

2. Heard, Mr. G.P. Dutta, learned counsel for the appellant-insurer and Mr. Pradeep Kumar Mishra, learned counsel for R-1 to 4 in the matter and perused the record, but none appears for R-5 despite valid service of notice of the appeal.

3. In support of the condonation of the delay, the appellant-insurer has taken the following averments in paragraph 4 to 8 of the petition which reads as under:-

“4. That it is submitted by this petitioner that after judgment was passed the dealing counsel submitted his opinion in the meantime the concerned Officer of the company left from company therefore the file was misplaced and could not traced out.

5. That the Bhubaneswar Office after tracing the file from the bunch of disposed of files processed the file and after obtaining necessary administrative sanction from the competent Authority forwarded it to the Zonal Office at Kolkata for according approval for filing appeal.

6. That the Zonal office after processing the file and after obtaining necessary administrative sanction from the competent Authority accorded approval and forwarded it to the Bhubaneswar office and in turn the Bhubaneswar office forwarded the file to the counsel for filing appeal.

7. That the counsel after receipt of the file requested the office to hand over all the relevant documents and after receipt of the same drafted the memorandum of appeal and the appeal was accordingly filed.

8. That it is submitted by the petitioner that when the judgment was passed by the learned Tribunal at this time the Officer who was dealing with this file but suffering from Covid- 19 and was on leave from the company and the file was not processed.”

4. In the aforesaid backdrop, Mr. Dutta, however, submits that since there was a miscommunication from the side of concerned officer of the Insurance Company, the delay has occasioned and thereby, the delay is neither intentional nor deliberate, but rather is due to unavoidable cost and therefore, the delay may kindly be condoned, but Mr. Pradeep Kumar Mishra, learned counsel for R-1 to 4, however, submits that the delay can never be said to be not intentional, rather it is intentional and the appellant-Insurance Company is only to avoid its liability has preferred this appeal with a delay of 1147 days and, therefore, the delay should not be condoned.

5. It is no doubt true that the appellant- Insurance Company has taken the plea of miscommunication from the side of concerned officer of the Insurance Company which is the primary reason for condonation of delay, but it can never be disputed that the Insurance Company is a statutory body and it cannot be treated like a simple litigant, more particularly when the Insurance Company is dealing such matters day in and day out. Further, compensation to the victim of motor vehicular accident is a product of Motor Vehicle Accident Act, 1988, which is a beneficial legislation of law and the aim and objective of the Act is to provide succor to the victims of accident and prevent them from destitution. In this case, the impugned judgment was passed on 24.09.2021 in a case of the year 2019 and the Insurance Company has fought the claim of the appellant diligently before the learned Tribunal, however, it has not preferred the appeal in time. In the context of condonation of delay, this Court considers it profitable to refer to the decision in Post Master General and others Vs. Living Media India Ltd. and another , (2012) 3 SCC 563 wherein the Apex Court in paragraph 29 has observed as under:-

“29. In o