A delay beyond the prescribed period can only be condoned in exceptional cases. The court has the discretion to condone a short delay if the party has acted bona fide and not in a negligent manner. The cause given for the delay must be sufficient to warrant condonation.

JUDGMENT :

The appellants, herein, had preferred these three connected Appeal from Orders, by invoking the provisions contained under Section 37 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1986, by putting a challenge to the orders, which had been passed under Section 34 of the Arbitration Act, by the learned District Judge, in Arbitration Case Nos. 104 of 2018, 103 of 2018 and 100 of 2018 respectively, whereby, the objection preferred by the appellants under Section 34 of the Act of 1996, was rejected by the judgment of 27.07.2019.

2. The Appeal from Orders under Section 37 of the Act, were preferred by the appellants on 22nd February, 2022. The Appeal from Orders were supported with Delay Condonation Application No. 1 of 2022, seeking a condonation of 140 days delay, which has been respectively chanced in each of the Appeal from Orders in filing the Appeals under Section 37 of the Act and primarily, the background, which has been taken therein for seeking condonation of the delay by the applicant/appellant, and on which, primarily, the appellant has addressed the Court, is that as contained in para 4, 6 and 8 of the affidavit filed in support of the respective Delay Condonation Applications, which is extracted hereunder :-

“4. That since the appellant is residing at Ghaziabad and therefore, it took her some time to collect the relevant documents as required to file the instant appeal.

6. That thereafter the husband of the appellant got stuck in his work and was able to come to Nainital on 12/22-10-2019, but thereafter the Hon’ble High Court was closed due to the Deepawali vacation from 23.10.2019 to 30.10.2019.

8. That thereafter due to the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic in the beginning of year 2020 along with the whole word the family of the appellant was also under shock and severe financial crisis. The impact of COVID-19 over an individual was such severe that the health and lifestyle of each and every individual was uprooted and the pandemic results in severe financial breakdown to the appellant.”

3. Let us deal with each of the grounds taken in the respective paragraphs extracted above, as to what genuineness could be attached to the pleadings raised for the purposes of condonation of delay. In para 4, the appellant has submitted that there was some time, which was taken by the appellant to collect the relevant documents required to file the instant Appeals. This particular paragraph has been pleaded on the basis of the personal knowledge, but if the certified, which has been filed with the Appeal from Orders, is taken into consideration, the certified copy of the same was applied by the appellant on 1st August, 2019, the same was pasted on the notice board on 7th August, 2019, and it was issued to the appellant on 7th August 2019.

4. Hence, the ground taken, that it took some time for the appellant to get certified copy of the order is absolutely belied from the folio of the certified copy of the impugned judgment itself.

5. Faced with the situation, the learned counsel for the appellant tried to carve out an exception, to his own detriment, that he had earlier applied for the certified copy, which got lost and due to which, the subsequent application was filed on 1st August, 2019.

6. There are two reasons for not to accept the said argument, firstly, it is not the basic ground, which has been pleaded by the appellant at the first available opportunity, in the Delay Condonation Application, which was available to the appellant at the time, when he filed the Delay Condonation Application on 22/02/2022. Hence, he cannot be permitted to take the liberty to argue beyond the pleadings, of the delay condonation application.

7. Hence, this contention that it took some time for him to procure the other documents to file the Appeals is yet again an argument which is not acceptable by this Court for the reason being, that the collection of the other document for filing of an Appeal from Order under Section 37 of the Act, would not be releva