16.03.2026 Present: Mr. D. N. Singhal, Counsel for the appellant appeared through VC.

RA-24/2025 IN FA-212/2025

ORDER

The Applicant has preferred the Review Application against the order dated 27.05.2025 passed in IA-987/2025 in FA-212/2025, whereby this Commission has dismissed the Application seeking condonation of delay filed by the Applicant/Appellant. The relevant portion of the order dated 27.05.2025 has been reproduced below for the ready reference herein:

“…23. The appellant has preferred not to mention the specific date as to when the file was taken up in January, 2025; as to when management sought another advocate's Techno-legal opinion; as to when the advocate was requested to obtain the certified copies of all the important documents; as to when the case file was examined; as to when necessary details were checked from the dealing office from their previous record; and as to when the senior authorities of the appellant took a decision to file the appeal.

24. It is the duty of the appellant to be aware of statutory period of filing the appeal.

25. Additionally, the appellant's sole justification in the aforementioned application was that the delay in filing the Appeal is Procedural delay. To this argument of the Appellant, we deem it appropriate to refer to the case of Office of the Chief Post Master General and Ors. Vs. Living Media India Ltd. and Ors. reported in AIR 2012 SC

1506, wherein the apex court has held as under:

"12…..The claim on account of impersonal machinery and inherited bureaucratic methodology of making several notes cannot be accepted in view of the modern technologies being used and available. The law of limitation undoubtedly binds everybody including the Government.

13. In our view, it is the right time to inform all the government bodies, their agencies and instrumentalities that unless they have reasonable and acceptable explanation for the delay and there was bonafide effort, there is no need to accept the usual explanation that the file was kept pending for several months/years due to considerable degree of procedural red-tape in the process. The government departments are under a special obligation to ensure that they perform their duties with diligence and commitment. Condonation of delay is an exception and should not be used as an anticipated benefit for government departments. The law, shelters everyone under the same light and should not be swirled for the benefit of a few."

26. Relying on the above settled law and considering the fact that there was no proper explanation offered by the appellant for the delay except inculpating the government lengthy approval procedures.

According to us, the appellant has miserably failed to give any acceptable and cogent sufficient reasons to condone such delay. As a result, it is abundantly clear from the above that the appellant was moving at its own pace unmindful that the prescribed period to file an appeal is 30 days from the date of impugned judgment.

27. Therefore, the application (IA-987/2025) filed by the appellant seeking condonation of delay cannot be admitted and accordingly, the same is dismissed on the above grounds.

28. Consequently, the present appeal filed beyond the statutory period also stands dismissed. However, in the facts of the case, there shall be no order as to cost.”

The Applicant has filed the present Review Application on the ground that the delay in filing the Appeal occurred due to limitation and not out of the negligence on the part of the Applicant/Appellant. The Applicant further submitted that due to the long inter- departmental legal opinions, the Appeal could not be filed within the stipulated period. Pressing the aforesaid, the counsel for the Applicant prayed for the review and recall of the order dated 27.05.2025.

We have perused the material available on record.

To deal with the present application, it is necessary to refer section 50 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019:

“50. Review by State Commission in certain cases.

The