TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2023 (8) TMI 1002
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....nation of delay is to be accepted and benefit of Notification No 50/2018-Customs dated 30.06.2018 is extendable to the party or not. 4.1 I have carefully gone through the facts of the case, appeal memo including the ground of appeal, oral submission, application of condonation of delay in filing appeal and relevant provisions of the Act. First of all, I take up the issue of Condonation of Delay of 23 days in filing the appeal. The Appellant has submitted that 'delay of 23 days has been caused due to the fact that documents required to file the appeal got mixed up with other files in the office. Due to that steps for filling the appeal within the limitation period could not be taken.' I find that the appeal has been filed after expiry of a....
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....lay of 23 days in filing the appeal which could not be explained by the appellant. 2.3 I have heard the Learned Authorized Representative appearing for the Revenue. He reiterates the findings of the impugned order. 3.1 I have considered the impugned order along with the submissions made in appeal and during the course of arguments. 3.2 The only issue that is for my consideration is whether the Commissioner (Appeal) was justified in not condoning the delay of 23 days in filing this appeal. 3.3 After hearing both sides, I find that it is a settled position in law that the appeal should not be dismissed for such reasons and the appellant should be given the opportunity to argue the matter on merits. In case of Municipal Corporation, Gwalio....
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.... has been making a justifiably liberal approach in matters, instituted in this Court. But the message does not appear to have percolated down to all the other Courts in the hierarchy. And such a liberal approach is adopted on principle as it is realized that :- 'Any appeal or any application, other than an application under any of the provisions of Order XXI of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, may be admitted after the prescribed period if the appellant or the applicant satisfies the Court that he had sufficient cause for not preferring the appeal or making the application within such period.' 1. Ordinarily a litigant does not stand to benefit by lodging an appeal late. 2. Refusing to condone delay can result in a meritorious matter....
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....e treatment and the law is administered in an even-handed manner. There is no warrant for according a stepmotherly treatment when the „State' is the applicant praying for condonation of delay. In fact experience shows that on account of an impersonal machinery (no one in-charge of the matter is directly hit or hurt by the judgment sought to be subjected to appeal) and the inherited bureaucratic methodology imbued with the note-making, file pushing, and passing-on-the-buck ethos, delay on its part is less difficult to understand though more difficult to approve. In any event, the State which represents the collective cause of the community, does not deserve a litigant-non-grata status. The Courts therefore have to be informed with the ....