21.08.2026 Court No. 12 Item No. 21 Sandip MAT 1301 of 2026 With CAN 1 of 2026 CAN 2 of 2026 The State of West Bengal & Ors. Vs. Swapan Malik Mr. Falguni Bandyopadhyay, Ms. Riya Ballav …for the State. Mr. Biswarup Biswas, Mr. Md. Mojnu Sk. … for the respondent. 1. The appeal arises out of an order dated March 20, 2025 passed by the learned single Judge in W.P.A. 11718 of 2024. The appeal is accompanied by an application for condonation of delay. 2. The appeal is delayed by 504 days. The explanation for the delay as stated in paragraphs 7 to 9 of the said application, being CAN 1 of 2026 are quoted below :- “7. Your Appellants states that the father of writ petitioner died on 5th October 1989 several corresponding has been made by the concerned authority in connection with his application for compassionate appointment. After communication of the impugned order dated 20.03.2025, by the Learned Advocate of the writ petitioner/Respondent herein, the appellants started to collect all papers and documents, it took petty long time to accumulate and collect all papers and in connection with service of the father of the petitioner from the district as it is a very old case. It is not out of place to mention here that from the early part of the year 2025, as direction of the Election Commission the state machinery was busy for pre revision activities of electoral roll and survey was also started for same. It is also made clear that other election related official 2 function were initiated and departmental staffs are also being reshuffled, subsequently the Special Intensive Revision (hereinafter referred as SIR) come into operation in the month of October 2025, and a large number of staffs of State Machinery were became fully engaged consequently other administrative works are being affected in large scale. The Election Commission thereafter declare the State Legislative Assembly Election on the month of 15th March 2026 and declaration of result on 4th May 2026 in the change political circumstances the Panel of the State Government Advocate has been changed. 8. Your Appellants state that after the change circumstance the appellants getting all papers and document come to the finding that the writ petitioner/opposite party herein obtained the order impugned suppressing the material fact which is require to be assailed in appeal court and consequently filed this appeal on 6th August 2026. 9. It is a fact that for granting approval so as to prefer an appeal at the instance of the concerned officials of the appellants/respondents, some considerable time had elapsed and as such the delay was thoroughly unintentional and such delay actually has occurred due to the engagement and involvement of large number of Government Staffs in Assembly Election 2026 and procedural activities since there are many inter-departmental procedures to be followed culminating to the approval of taking a decision at the highest level of the appellants/petitioners herein and the fact remains the State being the appellants/petitioners herein is an impersonal machinery decision making always involve discussions and coordination of different levels of officers and State employees and for which decisions are being taken at the earliest. Thus the delay regarding that may kindly be condoned for not taking prompt action in preferring the instant appeal within the specified period and the reasons for delay in preferring the instant appeal has been narrated in the aforesaid paragraphs.” 3. It is well settled that, State is not a privileged litigant. The State has to explain the delay. The Hon’ble Apex Court has laid down on numerous occasions that, explanations that the file had to move from table to table and the documents had to be collected which led to the delay in approaching an advocate for preparation of the 3 appeal papers, are not adequate grounds for condonation of delay. We find in this case, the order was delivered on March 20, 2025. The explanation given by the appellants is that, after communication of the order the appellants started to collect the papers which took a pretty long time. The expression “pretty long time” is not qualified by any period or relevant dates. Thus, “the pretty long time” that was taken to collect the papers in our view is a vague reason. The other explanation is that, as the father of the writ petitioner died sometime in 1989, the case was very old and papers were required to be collected. We cannot accept this explanation for the simple reason that, the learned advocates for the State were represented before His Lordship and it is presumed that the learned advocates were properly briefed in the matter. 4. We also find that a plea has been raised to the effect that the appellants were busy in complying with the directions of Election Commission and had to discharge functions under the relevant statute for the 18th Legislative Assembly Elections. Such explanation appears to be misconceived because the assembly election took place sometime in April-May, 2026. The last contention of Mr. Bandopadhyay that all the appellants were busy with the SIR process cannot be a ground for delay in approaching the learned advocate who had already been engaged in the writ petition, to prefer an appeal. 4 5. It is informed to us that contempt proceeding has been initiated and contempt rule has been issued. At such juncture, the appellants have suddenly become conscious of their right of appeal. 6. Mr. Biswas, learned advocate for the respondent has produced the order of His Lordship passed in CPAN 134 of 2026 dated August 10, 2026, in which we find that on July 31, 2025 it was undertaken on behalf of the alleged contemnor no. 1 that steps would be taken to comply with the order of His Lordship dated March 20, 2025. 7. Thus, the delay cannot be condoned. We refer to the decision of the Hon’ble Apex Court in State of Madhya Pradesh vs Ramkumar Choudhary reported in 2024 INSC 932 Paragraphs 6 and 7 thereof are quoted below :- “6. At the same time, we cannot simply brush aside the delay occurred in preferring the second appeal, due to callous and lackadaisical attitude on the part of the officials functioning the State machinery. Though the Government adopts systematic approach in handling the legal issues and preferring the petitions/applications/appeals well within the time, due to the fault on the part of the officials in merely communicating the information on time, huge revenue loss will be caused to the Government exchequer. The present case is one such case, wherein, enormous delay of 1788 days occasioned in preferring the second appeal due to the lapses on the part of the officials functioning under the State, though valuable Government lands were involved. Therefore, we direct the State to streamline the machinery touching the legal issues, offering legal opinion, filing of cases before the Tribunal/Courts, etc., fix the responsibility on the officer(s) concerned, and penalize the officer(s), who is/are responsible for delay, deviation, lapses, etc., if any, to the value of the loss caused to the Government. Such direction will have to be followed by all the States scrupulously. 5 8. There is one another aspect of the matter which we must not ignore or overlook. Over a period of time, we have noticed that whenever there is a plea for condonation of delay be it at the instance of a private litigant or State the delay is sought to be explained right from the time, the limitation starts and if there is a delay of say 2 years or 3 years or 4 years till the end of the same. For example if the period of limitation is 90 days then the party seeking condonation has to explain why it was unable to institute the proceedings within that period of limitation. What events occurred after the 91st day till the last is of no consequence. The court is required to consider what came in the way of the party that it was unable to file it between the 1st day and the 90th day. It is true that a party is entitled to wait until the last day of limitation for filing an appeal. But when it allows the limitation to expire and pleads sufficient cause for not filing the appeal earlier, the sufficient cause must establish that because of some event or circumstance arising before the limitation expired it was not possible to file the appeal within time. No event or circumstance arising after the expiry of limitation can constitute such sufficient cause. There may be events or circumstances subsequent to the expiry of limitation which may further delay the filing of the appeal. But that the limitation has been allowed to expire without the appeal being filed must be traced to a cause arising within the period of limitation. (See: Ajit Singh Thakur Singh and Another vs. State of Gujarat, AIR 1981 SC 733).” 9. Accordingly, we dismiss the application for condonation of delay. 10. However, Mr. Bandopadhyay’s contention that the writ petition suffered from suppression of facts and the case of the writ petitioner was rejected long ago was not told to His Lordship is noted. The respondents could have pressed this issue by filing a review application. 11. Urgent photostat certified copy of the order, if applied for, be given to the parties, upon usual undertakings. (Shampa Sarkar, J.) (Arjun Ray Mukherjee, J.)