Ajay Mohan Goel JUDGMENT
Ajay Mohan Goel, J.
1. By way of this petition, challenge has been laid to the order dated 16.1.2018 passed by the Court of learned Civil Judge, Court No. II, Amb, District Una in Civil Suit No. 171 of 2017 titled as Gurudwara Bei Sahjal v. Guruprakash and others, vide which an application filed before it purportedly on behalf of respondents No. 1 to 3 for extending the time to file written statement has been allowed.
2. Mr. Singh learned counsel for the petitioner has argued that the impugned order is per se not sustainable in the eyes of law, because while passing the said order, learned trial court erred in not appreciating that neither the application filed before it, which is at page 19 of the paper book (Annexure P-5) was a proper application, as the same was neither signed by any of the applicants, nor was it supported by an affidavit, nor the contents therein revealed that there was any cogent explanation in the application as to why the written statement could not have been filed by the applicants within time, as is envisaged in the Code of Civil Procedure. While making this submission, Mr. Singh has drawn the attention of this Court to Annexure P-4, which is copy of the Court notice served upon respondents No. 1 to 3, which demonstrates that said respondents/defendants were duly served on 16.9.2017 in the suit. Mr. Singh has further argued that the impugned order otherwise is also not sustainable in the eyes of law, as the same is a cryptic and a non speaking order, which neither deals with the contention so made in the application nor any reasoning has been assigned as to why the said application was allowed. Further grievance raised by Mr. Singh is that the application was allowed on the same date on which it was preferred by the applicant without affording any opportunity to the present petitioner to respond to the same.
3. Mr. Sharma learned counsel for respondents on the other hand has submitted that there is no infirmity with the impugned order as it was the discretion vested before the learned trial court to have had allowed any such application preferred before it and the application was allowed by the learned trial court in the interest of justice.
4. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have also gone through the documents appended with the present petition.
5. It is not in dispute that respondents No. 1 to 3, who are defendants No. 1 to 3 before the learned trial court were duly served on 16.9.2017. It is also a matter of record that since then several opportunities were given to the defendants to file their written statement, however, no written statement was filed. It is also a matter of record that on 16.1.2018 an application was filed for extension of time under Section 148 read with Section 151 of CPC through learned counsel by one applicant namely, Guruprakash. The contents of this application are reproduced hereinbelow:-
"1. That abovementioned case is pending before this Hon'ble Court and is fixed for filing W.S for today.
2. That for filing written statement, defendant needs old revenue record pertaining to year 1930ies and onwards and for that he had applied in various departments of District and Tehsil revenue offices. The above said record is very old and also in different languages which needs to be translated into court language.
3. That due to the reason mentioned in para No. 2 of this application, the defdt. is still unable to file the written statement and needs sufficient time to file the W.S.
It is, therefore, humbly prayed that the applicant/defdft. May kindly be given some more time to file the written statement in the interest of justice."
6. Incidentally, this application apparently has neither been signed........