LobIn Modi and ors. Vs. Steel Authority of India Ltd. a Govt. Company and ors.

- motor vehicles act, 1988 [c.a. no. 59/1988]section 173(1) proviso; [d. biswas, amitava roy & i.a.ansari, jj] appeal without statutory deposit but within limitation/or extended period of limitation maintainability - held, if the provision of a statute speaks of entertainment of appeal, it denotes that the appeal cannot be admitted to consideration unless other requirements are complied with. the provision of sub-section (1) of section 173 permits filing of an appeal against an award within 90 days with a rider in the first proviso that such appeal filed cannot be entertained unless the statutory deposit is made. the period of limitation is applicable only to the filing of the appeal and not to the deposit to be made. it, therefore, appears that an appeal filed under section 173 cannot be entertained i.e. cannot be admitted for consideration unless the statutory deposit is made and for this purpose the court has the discretion either to grant time to make the deposit or not. no formal order condoning the delay is necessary, an order of adjournment would suffice. the provisions of limitation embodied in the substantive provision of the sub-section (1) of section 173 of the act does not extend to the provision relating to the deposit of statutory amount as embodies in the first proviso. therefore an appeal filed within the period of limitation or within the extended period of limitation, cannot be admitted for hearing on merit unless the statutory deposit is made either with the memo of appeal or on such date as may be permitted by the court. no specific order condoning any delay for the purpose of deposit under first proviso to sub-section (1) of section 173 is necessary. [new india assurance co. ltd. v md. makubur rahman, 1993 (2) glr 430 and new india assurance co. ltd. v smt rita devi, 1997(2) glt 406, approved. new india assurance co. ltd. v birendra mohan de, 1995 (2) gau lt 218 (db) and union of india v smt gita banik, 1996 (2) glt 246, are not good law]. orderamreshwar sahay, j.1. heard mr. sahani, learned counsel for the petitioner and mr. sen, learned counsel for the respondents.2. the petitioners approached this court earlier, in cwjc no. 1844 of 1999 (r) making a grievance that although they alongwith others were appointed on daily wages basis as displaced persons in 1991 and some of them have been regularised in their services but case of the petitioners have not been considered.3. this court disposed of the writ petition by order dated 14.01.2000 directing the petitioners to approach the steel authority of india ltd. by filing a representation for redressal of their grievance. the said order is annexed as annexure-6 to the present writ application.4. pursuant thereto the petitioners filed a representation before the steel authority of india ltd. which has been disposed of by a reasoned order as contained in annexure-8 by the general manager, bokaro steel plant. from perusal of the order of the general manager, bokaro steel plant, as contained in annexure-8 disposing of the representation filed by the petitioners, it appears that some relevant and important facts have been taken note of, by him. firstly that the displaced persons have been offered jobs in bsl on casual basis and all of them joined bsl in april, 1992 pending production of land vacation certificate by them duly certified by dplr. it was further noticed that at the time of joining bokaro steel ltd., the workers gave undertakings to the effect that they would vacate the homestead lands in the case of their appointment as casual workers, but in spite of said undertakings, the land were not vacated despite of their appointment as displaced persons.5. i find that the impugned order rejecting the representation of the petitioners cannot be said to be unjustified on the facts and grounds mentioned in the impugned order.6. i find no reason to interfere with the impugned order. accordingly, this application is dismissed.