It is true, Section 15(5) of the Limitation Act provides that “In computing the period of limitation for any suit the time during which the defendant has been absent from India and from the territories outside India under the administration of Central Government shall be excluded.”
However, there is no corresponding provision in the Limitation Act which provides for exclusion of the period during which the plaintiff or the complainant has been absent from India. In the absence of any such specific provision, it may not be possible to apply the same principle to the absence of the plaintiff / complainant from India.
It is a well known principle of interpretation of statutes that a legal provision has to be construed literally if the language used in a statute is clear and unambiguous. In Section 15(5), the exclusion of period is only in respect of the absence of the defendant from India. It cannot be stretched to include the absence of plaintiff from India, by way of interpretation. Had there been a specific provision to that effect, that would have definitely been a different situation.
In the case of Lala Balmukund v. Lajwanti, (1975) 1 SCC 725 : AIR 1975 SC 1089, the Supreme Court has held that:
“…The Limitation Act deprives or restricts the right of an aggrieved person to have recourse to legal remedy, and where its language is ambiguous, that construction should be preferred which preserves such remedy to the one which bars or defeats it. A court ought to avoid an interpretation upon a statute of limitation by implication or inference as may have a penalising effect unless it is driven to do so by the irresistible force of the language employed by the Legislature.”
Therefore, it may not be possible to exclude the period during which the plaintiff or the complainant has been absent from India while computing the period of limitation.
Dr. Ashok Dhamija is a New Delhi based Supreme Court Advocate and author of law books. Read more about him by clicking here. List of his Forum Replies. List of his other articles. List of his Quora Answers. List of his YouTube Videos.
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