Litigant has to be vigilant of rights, proceedings: Delhi HC

New Delhi: A litigant also has to be vigilant about his or her rights and judicial proceedings and not blame lawyers for any delay in the case, the Delhi high court has said.

Justice Vinod Goel made the observation while dismissing a plea of a Delhi-based private company seeking condonation of a 400-day delay in filing an appeal against a trial court’s August 31, 2015 decision against the entity. The company had challenged the trial court’s direction to pay over Rs14 lakh with interest to another private firm.

The appellant-company, which claims to work in the field of architecture and arranging exhibitions, has alleged that the defendant firm availed its services for installing stalls in Petrotech 2009, an international conference of oil and gas companies.

The appellant company had claimed that despite carrying out the work to the defendant’s satisfaction, the entire bill of over Rs 46 lakh was not paid.

It had said that despite repeated reminders, the defendant firm had not paid the remaining balance. In its appeal in the high court, the appellant-company had blamed its advocate for the 400-day delay in challenging the trial court decision. It had said that its lawyer was negligent as he had not attended court proceedings and had not informed them about the progress of the case.

The court, however, rejected by their submissions and said, “The litigant owes a duty to be vigilant of his rights and is also expected to be equally vigilant about the judicial proceedings pending in the court of law against him or initiated at his instance.”