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Joginder Singh & Anr. vs. State of Punjab & Ors.

Review Petition (Civil) · 2022 INSC 261Decided 3 Mar 2022
Review Petition (Civil) No. 267 of 2022
Uday Umesh Lalit · S. Ravindra Bhat

Background

The petitioners' underlying dispute had already travelled through the Collector, the Financial Commissioner in revision, a Single Judge of the High Court in a writ petition, and a Letters Patent Appeal, losing at every stage. Their special leave petition to the Supreme Court against this chain of decisions was also dismissed after a full hearing. They then filed this review petition asking the Supreme Court to reconsider its own dismissal.

Decision Breakdown

The Court first rejected the petitioners' request to have the review petition listed for an open-court hearing. Reviewing the file, the Bench found that the grounds raised in the review petition did not disclose any "error apparent on the face of the record": the narrow standard required to reopen a decision already made after full argument. The review petition was accordingly dismissed.

Lesson Learnt

A review petition is not a second chance to re-argue a case that has already been heard and decided. It succeeds only where there is a glaring, self-evident error in the original order, not merely a disagreement with the outcome.

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

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