The Division Bench of High Court of Delhi has dismissed the condonation of delay because of unexplained and inordinate delay without ostensible reasons.
The appellant Principal Commissioner Central Tax, has filed application seeking condonation stating that the delay was due to misplacement of some of the file papers in the office which were recovered later on and the matter further got delayed due to oversight and inadvertence.’ Apart from the aforesaid, no other reason for condoning the delay was mentioned in the application.
Further, the application also did not specify the period of delay. Since the prayer clause of the said clause did not specify the number of days of delay, which the appellant prayed for being condoned, the appellant was given an opportunity to file a better application.
The Division Bench of Justice Vibhu Bakhru and Justice Amit Mahajan dismissed the appeal and observed that It was well settled that each day of delay in filing had to be explained. In the present case, there were large gaps in the time period for which no ostensible reason had been provided. The appellant had not only delayed in filing the present appeal but there was also an unexplained and inordinate delay in re-filing the appeal.
“Even if the period commencing from 15.03.2020 was excluded on account of disruption caused due to outbreak of covid 19. There was a period of six months between the date on which the appeal was marked as defective and the date when the lockdown was imposed in the wake of the pandemic,” the Bench further observed.
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