Mst. GHULAM FATIMA And Others vs MUHAMMAD AKRAM
The petitioners sought leave to appeal against the concurrent judgments of the High Court and the Additional District Judge, which had affirmed the dismissal of their application for the restoration of a civil appeal. The appeal had been dismissed in default on 9-9-1985. The petitioners filed a restoration application on 30-9-1985, with petitioner No. 1 claiming she misheard the adjourned date as 30-9-1985 due to her age and hearing impairment. The lower courts rejected this explanation for lack of sufficient cause. The core legal question was whether the lower courts erred in refusing to restore the appeal dismissed in default. The Supreme Court held that the concurrent findings regarding the absence of sufficient cause suffered from no legal infirmity and dismissed the petition. The key principle established is that findings of fact regarding sufficient cause for non-appearance by lower courts will not be interfered with by the Supreme Court unless shown to be infirm.
- Whether an elderly litigant's mistaken impression of an adjourned date due to hearing impairment constitutes sufficient cause for the restoration of an appeal dismissed in default?
- Will the Supreme Court interfere with concurrent findings of lower courts regarding the lack of sufficient cause for non-appearance?
ORDER
SAAD SAOOD JAN, J.--The petitioners appeal from the judgment and decree of a civil Court was dismissed in default on 9-9-1985. They filed an application on 30-9-1985 for the restoration of the appeal. One of them, namely, petitioner No. l, appeared in support of the application and alleged that she was present in Court when the appeal was adjourned to 9-9-1975. Being an old woman she was short of hearing. She took the impression that the appeal was to come up on 30-9-1985 instead of 9-9-1985. The learned Additional District Judge rejected this explanation and dismissed the application for restoration. The High Court affirmed the finding of the Additional District Judge.
The petitioners now seek leave to appeal from this Court.
2. There are concurrent findings of the high Court and the Additional District Judge that the petitioners have not been able to show sufficient cause for the restoration of the appeal. We are not persuaded that the view taken by them suffers from any infirmity. We would accordingly dismiss this petition.