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Delhi Development Authority v. Gaurav Kumar & Ors.

Review Petition (Civil) · 2021 INSC 584Decided 30 Sept 2021
Review Petition (Civil) Diary No. 1141 of 2018 in Civil Appeal No. 6179 of 2017
Justice Ajay Rastogi · Justice Abhay S. Oka

Background

This is a restoration order, not a final judgment; the appeal goes back for hearing. A common judgment of the Delhi High Court dated 7 July 2015 had been challenged separately in the Supreme Court by both the Government of NCT of Delhi and by the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), in two different petitions. Due to an administrative mix-up, the Government of NCT of Delhi's appeal got wrongly clubbed with an unrelated bunch of matters and was dismissed along with them on 4 May 2017, even though it had nothing to do with that bunch. The DDA (whose own, separate challenge to the same High Court judgment was still pending) filed this review petition to have that mistaken dismissal undone.

Decision Breakdown

This is a restoration order, not a final judgment; the appeal goes back for hearing. The Supreme Court accepted that the earlier dismissal had occurred through inadvertence: the Government of NCT of Delhi's appeal was never actually connected to the group of matters it got bundled and dismissed with. The Court condoned the delay in filing the review, allowed the review petition, recalled its own 4 May 2017 judgment in that appeal, restored the appeal to its original number, and directed it to be heard together with the DDA's own pending petition challenging the same High Court judgment, so that both challenges to the same underlying judgment would finally be considered together.

Lesson Learnt

Not applicable in the usual "legal principle" sense: this order only corrects a procedural/administrative error (a wrongly tagged and dismissed appeal) and restores the case for a proper hearing; it illustrates that the Supreme Court can revisit and recall even its own final judgment through a review petition when convinced a genuine inadvertent mistake caused an unintended outcome.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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