In ‘hi-tech, click-of-mouse age’, some government officials still working at snail’s pace: Delhi HC

“Despite anguish expressed by courts at all levels through various judicial pronouncements, no change in work attitude of officials of some of the government departments has taken place,” the judges said.

“Even in this hi-tech ‘click of mouse’ age some of the government officials are yet to come out of their love for ‘snail pace’ style of working. Worst is when such delays are aimed at simply completing formalities so that the government appeals get dismissed on the grounds of limitation, to the designed benefit of the other party. Whatever be the reason, it is either the loss to the exchequer or abrogation of the valuable rights of the assessee litigating against the State. Such negligent or deliberate dormancy on the part of government officials cannot be countenanced,” the court held.

The observations came in an application filed by the Principal Commissioner of Income Tax (4) seeking condonation of a delay of 498 days in filing an appeal under the Income Tax Act. As per the Act, the time limit within which appeals against orders passed by the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) can be filed is 120 days; it further states that High Court may admit an appeal after the expiry of the 120 days, if it is satisfied that there was sufficient cause for not filing the appeal within that period.

The bench further stated that time has come to take drastic measures “qua lethargy caused litigation delays, lest the chaos in judicial functioning percolated” further.

“Time has come when due diligence has to replace negligence which pervades some of the government agencies as in the present case, so that justice does not hang at the altar of dereliction, default, negligence and indifference,” the bench observed.

The HC dismissed the application observing that it was unable “to find any cause, what to say of sufficient cause” explaining the delay of 498 days in filing the appeal.

In the application, the petitioner authority claimed that the delay had occurred due to “sufficient cause” in spite of due procedure followed by them while filing the appeal. They said that the delay arose due to bonafide circumstances and they made earnest efforts to expedite the process at various stages of finalising the appeal, within the earliest possible time.

The petitioner’s counsel said that the power to condone the delay must be exercised liberally in favour of the applicant, especially where the applicant is a “government body and the exchequer is involved”.

Opposing the application for condonation of delay, the respondent assessee M/s National Fertilizers Ltd said that no circumstances were set up in the application to explain such inordinate delay in filing the appeal.

The high court noted the application appeared to be a “cyclostyled” proforma in which the number of days of delay has been subsequently filled, reflecting the total lack of seriousness with which the issue of limitation has been taken up. It further observed that the authority “to expect the least” should have “explained explicitly” the circumstances that led to delay.

“Can such laxity on the part of one of the litigants be ignored so as to snatch away from the other party a right which accrued to it on account of non-filing of appeal in time? The answer, according to us, has to be in negative. We are unable to fathom why the State despite having at its disposal an enormous paraphernalia is unable to act with due expedition. In such cases, plea of the state that it could not obtain copies or even certified copies in time sounds pathetically absurd and hence is unacceptable,” the bench said.