COVID Limitation Orders Didn’t Save Supplier’s Rs 3.73 Lakh Goods Suit Filed In June 2023: J&K And Ladakh HC Upholds Dismissal

The appellant-plaintiff sued to recover ₹3,73,477 for goods supplied to the respondents, with interest, filing the suit on 3 June 2023.

The respondents were set ex parte. The Commercial Court dismissed the suit as time-barred, finding that the last delivery was on 1 March 2020 and that the limitation period expired on 28 February 2023

On appeal, although the appellant had also pleaded a running account and subsequent acknowledgments, counsel pressed only the argument that the COVID-19 limitation-exclusion orders applied

Article 14 of the Limitation Act, as applied by the Court, required the suit for the price of goods to be filed within three years of the last delivery; the Court stated that the limitation period expired on 28 February 2023.

Under the Supreme Court’s order of 10 January 2022 in In Re: Cognizance for Extension of Limitation, the period from 15 March 2020 to 28 February 2022 stood excluded; where limitation would have expired during that interval, a minimum period of 90 days from 1 March 2022 was available, or any longer actual balance period.

The Court held that this did not permit exclusion of the entire period from 15 March 2020 to 28 February 2022 where the limitation period expired after 28 February 2022.

The Court treated 28 February 2023 as the deadline for filing the suit under Article 14.

Because that date fell after 28 February 2022, the Court held that the COVID-19 orders did not extend the limitation period by excluding the entire COVID-affected period; the 90-day provision applied to cases in which limitation would have expired between 15 March 2020 and 28 February 2022. The suit, filed on 3 June 2023, was therefore beyond the deadline