National Company Law Tribunal Rules, 2016 – Rule 50 – National Company Law Appellate Tribunal Rules, 2016 – Rule 22 – Interpretation of:
Held: Rule 22(2) of the NCLAT Rules requires that every appeal shall be accompanied by a certified copy of the impugned order – Rule 50 of the NCLT Rules prescribes that the Registry shall send a certified copy of the final order free of cost and certified copies may be made available on payment of costs in terms of the Schedule of Fees in all other cases – Both the certified copy which is made available free of cost as well as the certified copy which is made available on the payment of costs, are treated as certified copies for the purpose of Rule 50 – A litigant who does not apply for a certified copy cannot then fall back and claim that he was awaiting the grant of a free copy to obviate the bar of limitation. [Para 19]
National Company Law Tribunal Rules, 2016 – Rule 50 – National Company Law Appellate Tribunal Rules, 2016 – Rule 22 – Before NCLAT, appellant filed an application for condonation of delay on the ground that the appeal was lodged with delay of 3 days beyond the 30 day period prescribed – A divergence arose between the two members of the NCLAT – The third member agreed with the judicial member in dismissing the application for condonation of delay: Held: The Judicial Member, NCLAT held that the certified copy which was filed by the appellant was a “free of cost” copy and hence in the absence of an application for the grant of a certified copy, the delay of three days could not be condoned – The Technical Member, on the other hand, held that no distinction could be made between certified copies obtained through the payment of fee and a free copy and sufficient cause was shown for condoning the delay of three days – The third member agreed with the judicial member – In the instant case, the free copy was made available on 14.11.2023 after the decision of the NCLT was pronounced on 30.10.2023 – The appeal was lodged on 02.12.2023 – The appeal was lodged with a delay of only three days beyond the statutory period of 30 days and, therefore, fell within the condonable period of 15 days – Sufficient cause was shown for condoning the delay of three days – A Schedule of Fees is prescribed by the NCLT Rules – Entry 31 of the Schedule stipulates that the fee for obtaining true certified copies of final orders passed to parties other than the concerned parties under Rule 50 shall be Rupees five per page – The stipulation of Rupees five per page in Entry 31 excludes “the concerned parties under Rule 50” – The provisions of Rule 50 of the NCLT Rules place both the free certified copy as well as the certified copy which is applied for on payment of fees on the same footing – The appeal in the present case was filed within the condonable period of 15 days, which should have been condoned – Accordingly, the delay of three days in filing the appeal shall stand condoned. [Paras 5, 20, 21, 22, 23]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Ankit Gyan. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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