A 7-year delay in filing an appeal cannot be explained away by a pandemic that began three years after the judgment or by disagreement among co-owners, the Gujarat High Court has held while declining to condone it.
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Ahmedabad: The Gujarat High Court has refused to condone a delay of over seven years in filing an appeal against a trial court judgment in a civil suit, holding that non-consensus among the plaintiffs over filing the appeal and the Covid-19 pandemic did not constitute sufficient cause, and dismissed the petition challenging the appellate court’s rejection of the delay condonation application [Vinodchandra Chandrakant Thaker and Another v. Kiritkumar Parshottam Dhokai].
Justice Maulik J. Shelat passed the order on October 1, 2026 in a special civil application heard with the petitioner Vinod C. Thaker appearing for the petitioners and Advocate Krishnan M. Ghavariya appearing for the respondent.
Why neither excuse worked
Taking the co-owners’ lack of consensus first, Justice Shelat noted that the first petitioner is himself a lawyer. If there was no consensus, he could have filed the appeal alone and joined the other co-plaintiffs as respondents.
The Covid-19 plea fared no better. The pandemic began in 2020, the Court noted, whereas the judgment under challenge was of 2017, and the delay ran on long after the pandemic period. It could not, therefore, account for a gap of seven years.
How the delay arose
The petitioners had wanted to challenge a trial court judgment dated March 15, 2017, but filed their appeal only in 2024. The appellate court rejected their application for condonation of delay, and they came to the High Court against that rejection. Their reasons for the delay were the Covid-19 pandemic, the death of the second petitioner’s son in April 2021, and the difficulty of reaching consensus among several co-owners of the property.
Outcome
The appellate court, the Court held, was correct in rejecting the condonation application, and no interference was called for. The petition stood dismissed.
Why the order matters
Condonation of delay turns on a cause that is both genuine and sufficient. Internal disagreement among co-litigants, or a general reference to the pandemic, does not stop limitation from running when a litigant could have acted alone. The order also shows the Court treating a petitioner’s legal training as relevant to why the appeal was not filed in time.
Case Title: Vinodchandra Chandrakant Thaker and Another v. Kiritkumar Parshottam Dhokai [C/SCA/14619/2025]
Bench: Justice Maulik J. Shelat, Gujarat High Court
Date of Order: October 1, 2026
Appearances: Vinod C. Thaker for the petitioners; Advocate Krishnan M. Ghavariya for the respondent