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2026 (3) TMI 156
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....mpany Appeal (AT) (Ins.) No.110 of 2026 praying for condonation of 103 days delay in filing the Appeal. Prayers made in the application are as follows: "a. pass an order allowing the present Application and condoning the delay of 103 days in filing the accompanying Appeal against the order dated 13.08.2025 passed by the Hon'ble NCLT, Mumbai Bench in IA(IBC) (Plan) No. 53/2025 in C.P. (IB) No. 77/MB/2024 on behalf of the Appellant; and b. pass such other order as this Hon'ble Court may deem fit and proper in the interest of justice, equity and good conscience." 2. Company Appeal (AT) (Ins.) No.110 of 2026 has been filed by the IBBI challenging the order dated 13.08.2025 passed by the National Company Law Tribunal, Mumbai, Court-IV in IA (IBC) (Plan) No.53 of 2025 in C.P. (IB) No.77/MB/2024 in the matter of Piramal Capital & Housing Finance Ltd. vs. Township Developers India Ltd. By the impugned order, the Adjudicating Authority has allowed IA (IBC) (Plan) No.53 of 2025 approving the Resolution Plan. This Appeal challenging the order dated 13.08.2025 has been filed on 24.12.2025. There being delay of 103 days in filing of the Appeal, IA No.391 of 2026 has....
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....y order passed by the Adjudicating Authority. 6. Learned Counsel appearing for the Respondents refuting the submissions of the Appellant submits Section 61 of the IBC, which provides for limitation for filing an Appeal, does not contain any exception that this Tribunal has jurisdiction to condone the delay, which is filed beyond 30 days and maximum condonable period being 15 days, the Appeal having been filed after 45 days with a delay of 103 days, needs to be dismissed as barred by time. It is submitted that reliance on Section 198 by the Appellant is misconceived. It is submitted that Section 198 specifically confers power to condone the delay on the Adjudicating Authority, which is relevant to Adjudicating Authority and such provision cannot be relied upon to condone the delay before this Appellate Tribunal. It is further submitted that the Appellant has misconceived and misinterpreted the scope of application and object of Section 198. The said provisions intended to enable condonation of delay only in relation to performance specific to regulatory and administrative act, which the Appellant statutorily bound to perform during the CIRP and liquidation of CD. The Appellant hi....
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....g Authority under sub-section (3)." 10. The sheet anchor argument of the Appellant is the Section 198, which deals with condonation of delay. Section 198 is in Part IV, Chapter-2 of the IBC, which provides as follows: "198. Condonation of delay. - Notwithstanding anything contained in this Code, where the Board does not perform any act within the period specified under this Code, the relevant Adjudicating Authority may, for reasons to be recorded in writing, condone the delay." 11. Learned Counsel for the Appellant has also submitted that Section 198 begins with non-obstante clause, i.e. "Notwithstanding anything contained in this Code". It is submitted that Section 198 shall override Section 61, hence, limitation for Section 61 can also overridden by Section 198. When we look into the statutory Scheme under Section 198, the said provision has been engrafted in reference to "where the Board does not perform any act within the period specified under this Code". Thus, the power to condone the delay is related to performance of function in the period specified under the Code. For example Section 16 sub-section (4) on which reliance has been placed by the Appellant, the ....
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....C (L&S) 316 : AIR 1981 SC 852] (AIR para 13), S.M. Nilajkar v. Telecom District Manager [(2003) 4 SCC 27 : 2003 SCC (L&S) 380] (SCC para 12). 13. In Hindustan Lever Ltd. v. Ashok Vishnu Kate [(1995) 6 SCC 326 : 1995 SCC (L&S) 1385] this Court observed: (SCC pp. 347-48, paras 41-42) '4. The principles of statutory construction are well settled. Words occurring in statutes of liberal import such as social welfare legislation and human rights' legislation are not to be put in Procrustean beds or shrunk to Lilliputian dimensions. In construing these legislations the imposture of literal construction must be avoided and the prodigality of its misapplication must be recognised and reduced. Judges ought to be more concerned with the "colour", the "content" and the "context" of such statutes (we have borrowed the words from Lord Wilberforce's opinion in Prenn v. Simmonds [(1971) 1 WLR 1381 : (1971) 3 All ER 237 (HL)] ). In the same opinion Lord Wilberforce pointed out that law is not to be left behind in some island of literal interpretation but is to enquire beyond the language, unisolated from the matrix of facts in which they are set; the law is not to be interpret....
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....' " (emphasis supplied) 14. In our opinion, if we adopt a restrictive meaning to the expression "accidental falling of a passenger from a train carrying passengers" in Section 123(c) of the Railways Act, we will be depriving a large number of railway passengers from getting compensation in railway accidents. It is well known that in our country there are crores of people who travel by railway trains since everybody cannot afford travelling by air or in a private car. By giving a restrictive and narrow meaning to the expression we will be depriving a large number of victims of train accidents (particularly poor and middle class people) from getting compensation under the Railways Act. Hence, in our opinion, the expression "accidental falling of a passenger from a train carrying passengers" includes accidents when a bona fide passenger i.e. a passenger travelling with a valid ticket or pass is trying to enter into a railway train and falls down during the process. In other words, a purposive, and not literal interpretation should be given to the expression." 14. Learned Counsel for the Appellant submits that the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the above case has emphasized on....
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.... legislature, a more extended meaning may be attributed to the words, if they are fairly susceptible of it. The construction must not, of course, be strained to include cases plainly omitted from the natural meaning of the words." (p. 66) "... In determining either the general object of the legislature, or the meaning of its language in any particular passage, it is obvious that the intention which appears to be most in accord with convenience, reason, justice or legal principles, should, in all cases of doubtful significance, be presumed to be the true one." (p. 183) 37. Craies on Statute Law, 7th Edn., p. 262: "... It is the duty of courts of justice to try to get at the real intention of the legislature by carefully attending to the whole scope of the statute to be construed' ... that in each case you must look to the subject-matter, consider the importance of the provision and the relation of that provision to the general object intended to be secured by the Act, and upon a review of the case in that aspect decide whether the enactment is what is called imperative or only directory." 38. A. Driedger, Construction of Statute, 2nd Edn., 1983, p....
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.... without acknowledging that they have in any way supplemented the statute would be the proper criterion. The duty of Judges is to expound and not to legislate is a fundamental rule. There is no doubt a marginal area in which the courts mould or creatively interpret legislation and they are thus finishers, refiners and polishers of legislation which comes to them in a state requiring varying degrees of further processing. (See : Corocraft Ltd. v. Pan American World Airways Inc. [Corocraft Ltd. v. Pan American World Airways Inc., (1968) 3 WLR 714 (QB) : (1969) 1 QB 616 (CA)], WLR at p. 732 and State of Haryana v. Sampuran Singh [State of Haryana v. Sampuran Singh, (1975) 2 SCC 810] .) But by no stretch of imagination a Judge is entitled to add something more than what is there in the statute by way of a supposed intention of the legislature. It is, therefore, a cardinal principle of construction of statutes that the true or legal meaning of an enactment is derived by considering the meaning of the words used in the enactment in the light of any discernible purpose or object which comprehends the mischief and its remedy to which the enactment is directed." 42. Touching upon t....
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....entrusted with the responsibility of framing guidelines with respect to the insolvency professionals, insolvency professional agencies and information utilities and other instructions and it has wide set of powers. 19. One more submission, which has been advanced by learned Counsel for the Appellant is that power under Section 198 for condonation of delay can be exercised by this Appellate Tribunal, although the provision refers to relevant Adjudicating Authority. The Adjudicating Authority is defined in Section 5, sub-section (1) in following manner: "5(1) "Adjudicating Authority", for the purposes of this Part, means National Company Law Tribunal constituted under section 408 of the Companies Act, 2013 (18 of 2013);" 20. As noted above, it is the power of Adjudicating Authority to condone the delay when IBBI does not perform any function within the period specified under the IBC. The purpose and object is entirely different. It is true that the Appellate Tribunal can also exercise the jurisdiction, which is vested in the Adjudicating Authority, but the power has been given for specific purpose and object to the relevant Adjudicating Authority, which can never be in....
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....ppeal is continuation of the proceedings; in effect the entire proceedings are before the Appellate Authority and it has the power to review the evidence subject to statutory limitations prescribed. But in the case of revision, whatever powers the revisional authority may or may not have, it has no power to review the evidence, unless the statute expressly confers on it that power. It was noted by the four Judge Bench in Hari Shankar v. Rao Girdhari Lal Chowdhury [AIR 1963 SC 698] that the distinction between an appeal and a revision is a real one. A right of appeal carries with it a right of rehearing on law as well as fact, unless the statute conferring the right of appeal limits the rehearing in some way, as has been done in second appeals arising under the Code. The power of hearing revision is generally given to a superior court so that it may satisfy itself that a particular case has been decided according to law. Reference was made to Section 115 of the Code to hold that the High Court's powers under the said provision are limited to certain particular categories of cases. The right there is confined to jurisdiction and jurisdiction alone." 23. Learned Counsel for the....