Haryana Public Moneys (Recovery of Dues) Act, 1979 – State Financial Corporation Act, 1951 – Limitation Act, 1963 – The appellants herein had relied upon the judgment of a threeJudge Bench of the Supreme Court in State of Kerala and Others vs. V.R. Kalliyanikutty & Anr. to contend that a timebarred debt under the Limitation Act cannot be recovered under the Recovery of Dues Act – Respondent contended that the impugned order of the High Court was perfectly justified in holding that the decision of this Court in V.R. Kalliyanikutty has not considered the holding in Bombay Dyeing and Tilokchand Motichand:
Held: The Division Bench in the impugned order do not directly address the holding in V.R. Kalliyanikutty that the Kerala Revenue Recovery Act did not create any additional right to recover and enforce the outstanding amounts due – The real question that arises is do the State Financial Corporations Act, 1951 and the Recovery of Dues Act create a distinct right and provided an alternative mechanism of enforcement to recover the amount due, even if the amounts due were time barred – While the process of filing a civil suit may be barred because of the statute of limitation, the power to recover vested through Section 32-G of the State Financial Corporations Act read with Section 2(c) and Section 3 of the Recovery of Dues Act is a distinct power which continues notwithstanding that another mode of recovery through a civil suit is barred – Understood in that sense, it does appear that there is an additional right to enforce the claims of the financial corporations notwithstanding the bar of limitation – Also, in a three-judge Bench decision of the Supreme Court in K.C. Ninan v. Kerala State Electricity Board, 2023 INSC 560, the Court noticed the decision in V.R. Kalliyanikutty and concluded that statute of limitation only barred a remedy, while the right to recover the loan through ‘any other suitable manner provided’ remains untouched – For a comprehensive consideration and an authoritative pronouncement after taking into account all aspects, the matter needs to be placed before the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India to constitute an appropriate three-judge Bench. [Paras 13, 14, 18, 31, 32]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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