THE HONOURABLE SRI JUSTICE N.TUKARAMJI CIVIL REVISION PETITION No.1985 OF 2025

ORDER:

This Civil Revision Petition is filed aggrieved by the order dated

16.04.2025 passed in I.A.No.278 of 2025 in O.S.No.43 of 2020 by the learned Principal Junior Civil Judge-cum-Judicial Magistrate of First Class, at Sircilla.

2. Heard Mr.P.Shravan Kumar Goud, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr.B.Venkateshwarlu, learned counsel for the respondent No.1.

3. The respondent No.1/plaintiff instituted O.S. No. 43 of 2020 seeking a decree of perpetual injunction restraining the defendants, together with their family members, agents, workmen, and any other persons acting on their behalf, from entering upon or otherwise interfering with the plaintiff’s peaceful possession and enjoyment of his open plot of land admeasuring 56 square yards, situated in Survey No. 1367/B, adjacent to House No. 5-22, Nimmapelli Z.P. Road, Chandrampet, village of Sircilla Town and Mandal, within the municipal limits of Sircilla, Rajanna Sircilla District.

4. Subsequently, during the pendency of the suit, the petitioner/defendant No.1 filed I.A. No. 278 of 2025 under Order VIII Rule 9 read with Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (CPC), seeking leave to file an additional written statement and to have the same received as part of the record. On 16.04.2025, the trial Court, after hearing submissions of both parties, dismissed the said application. Aggrieved by this order, the petitioner has preferred the present Civil Revision Petition.

5. Learned counsel for the petitioner contends that the application seeking leave to file the additional written statement was submitted within four days of filing the original written statement. However, the trial Court, without properly appreciating the relevance of the additional pleadings, erroneously rejected the request. Counsel further submits that the petitioner/defendant No.1, having sought to place all material facts before the trial Court through the proposed additional written statement, would cause no prejudice to respondent No.1/plaintiff. Accordingly, it is urged that this Court may set aside the impugned order and permit the filing of the additional written statement.

6. Conversely, learned counsel for respondent No.1 supports the impugned order, arguing that the application was filed belatedly and that the documents and averments sought to be introduced were irrelevant to the real issues in controversy. It is further submitted that the application was a dilatory tactic intended to protract the proceedings, thereby causing unnecessary inconvenience not only to respondent No.1 but also to the trial process. Counsel maintains that the trial Court, having duly considered the material on record, rightly dismissed the application by passing a proper and justifiable order. Hence, the petitioner has no sustainable ground to seek interference with the impugned order.

7. I have perused the material on record.

8. The petitioner/defendant No.1 contends that certain material aspects, which ought to have been pleaded in the written statement, were inadvertently omitted in the earlier filing. The additional written statement, if permitted, would enable the petitioner/defendant No.1 to place his complete case before the Court for proper adjudication. The record, however, reveals that the application was filed at a belated stage.

9. Ordinarily, delay in filing an additional written statement is not by itself a sufficient ground for rejection. The settled principle of law is that pleadings should generally be permitted, unless such allowance causes irreparable prejudice to the opposite party or amounts to an abuse of process of Court. At the stage of considering an application under Order VIII Rule 9 CPC read with Section 151 CPC, the Court is not required to enter into the merits of the proposed pleadings or assess the evidentiary value of documents annexed thereto. The scope is confined to determining whether sufficient cause is sh