Review jurisdiction cannot be used to re-argue an appeal absent an apparent error.

The petitioners sought to condone a 189-day delay in representing their review application against the High Court’s judgment dated 1 August 2025 dismissing their second appeal.

The review application also included a petition to condone a 77-day delay in filing it.

The second appeal had affirmed dismissal of the petitioners’ suit. In doing so, the Court relied on an earlier partition suit and compromise decree of 1971, finding that the subject-property issues had been settled and that the petitioners’ predecessors had received separate properties.

The Court considered the review grounds while deciding the representation-delay petition.

Whether the 189-day delay in representing the review application should be condoned

Whether the review application disclosed a ground for review under Order XLVII Rule 1 CPC, or instead sought to re-agitate the merits of the second appeal

Order IV Rule 9(4) of the Appellate Side Rules, 1965 governed the petition to condone delay in representation.

Section 114 and Order XLVII Rule 1 CPC confine review to discovery of new and important evidence despite due diligence, an error apparent on the face of the record, or another sufficient reason analogous to those grounds; review is not an appeal in disguise and cannot be used to rehear a matter or substitute one view for another.

The Court relied on Malleeswari v. K. Suguna and Another, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 1927, which restated these limits and the distinction between review and appellate jurisdiction.

The Court noted that the second-appeal judgment had considered the 1971 compromise decree and the relevant documents, and had recorded that the petitioners’ counsel accepted that relief could not properly be sought on the basis of Exs. A1 and A2 in view of Exs. B1 and B2.

The review grounds challenged the merits of that decision rather than identifying new evidence, a patent error, or an analogous sufficient reason. They therefore fell outside the permissible scope of review.

Given the history of the litigation and the Court’s view that the settled property dispute should not be prolonged, it proceeded to consider the review on merits despite the delay in representation.

It consequently rejected the review application at the SR stage and closed the connected CMP.SR, with no order as to costs.