N.U. Beg, J. - (1.) This appeal arises out of a writ petition which was directed against an order of the Deputy Director of Consolidation, Jaunper, dated the 6th of January, 1960. The purpose of the writ petition was to have the said order quashed by this Court. In view of the fact that the sole argument that has been heard by us at this stage relates to the question of limitation, we propose to give in this judgment only those facts which are relevant to this particular point. It may be mentioned that all these facts are admitted by the parties before us, and are also borne out by the record of the case. The endorsement at the back of the certified copy of the order which was filed along with the writ petition shows that the application for a copy of the order sought to be impugned was given on the 9th of January, 1960, and that the copy was ready for delivery on the 13th of January, 1960. It would appear that under Ch. XXII, R. 1, sub-R. (4) of this Court, it was incumbent on the petitioner to serve a notice of the motion on certain parties mentioned therein. To comply with it a notice was served on behalf of the applicants on the Standing Counsel as required under Ch. XXII, R. 1, sub-R. 4 on the 7th of April, 1960. Thereafter, on the 18th of April, 1960 the present application was filed in the High Court. On the same day the learned Judge dismissed the said application in limine on the ground of limitation. He did not go into the merits of the case. The order passed by the learned Judge is a brief one, and runs as follows:- "This application appears to be beyond time, the last impugned order having been passed on the 6th of January, 1960. More than 90 days have elapsed since then. The petition is accordignly rejected."
(2.) Dissatisfied with the said order the petitioners filed this special appeal. As more or less similar orders were passed by the same learned Judge in a large number of applications, all these applications were connected. All of them have been heard by us along with this application. We, however, propose to make this appeal the leading case, and to give our reasons exhaustively in our judgment in this case. Our Judgment in this case wall govern other cases in which we shall merely refer to this judgment for the reasons in support of our view in those cases.
(3.) Having heard learned counsel for the parties at considerable length, we are of opinion that this appeal should be allowed. Learned counsel appearing for the appellants has argued before us that the order of the learned Single Judge dismissing the writ petition summarily on the ground of limitation without going into the merits of the case is an unjustifiable one. In this connection he has argued that the learned single judge should have taken into consideration the fact that the petitioner had applied for a certified copy of the judgment, and that five days were taken in obtaining the said copy. He has further invited our attention to the fact that under the rules of this Court it was incumbent on the petitioner to serve a notice of the motion on the Standing Counsel, and that 14 clear days notice was necessary in that connection. If the period spent in obtaining a certified copy of the said order, and 14 days time required for giving notice to the Standing Counsel under the Rules of this Court is taken into consideration, then the application would be admittedly within time. The learned counsel has, therefore, argued that the application should not have been dismissed summarily on the ground of limitation. The two questions, therefore, that have arisen before us are, first, whether in a case like the present a party is entitled to the exclusion of time spent in obtaining a certified copy of the order; and, secondly, whether a party is further entitled to the exclusion of 14 days time required for giving notice to the Standing Counsel under Ch. XXII, R. 1, sub-R. (4) of the High Court Rules.;