Judgment 1. In this revision petition filed under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure (for short, "the Code") the legality of the judgment dated 24-5-1983 passed by the Additional District Judge, Bhatinda whereby an appeal filed by the defendant - petitioner (hereinafter referred to as "defendant") against the judgment and decree dated 30-1-1980 of the Additional Senior Sub-Judge, Bhatinda was dismissed as time barred, has been challenged. 2. A few facts necessary for adjudication of the controversy in this case need to be noticed first. The plaintiff - respondent (hereinafter referred to as "plaintiff") filed a suit for recovery of Rs. 44,882.77 against the defendant. The suit was decreed by the trial Court by judgment and decree dated 30-1-1980. Defendant preferred appeal which had been filed after the expiry of period of limitation. Along with the appeal, an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act. 1963 (In short the "Act") for condonation of delay was also filed. The application was dismissed and consequently, the appeal was also dismissed as time-barred. 3. Further uncontroverted facts are that the trial Court passed the judgment and decree on 30-1-1980. An application for obtaining certified copy of the judgment and decree was made by the defendant on 5-2-1980. copy of the judgment and decree was prepared on 21-6-1980. The defendant filed appeal against the judgment and decree of the trial Court, in this Court on 15-9-1980, but the same was returned by the Registry of this Court on 19-9-1980 with the objection that the same did not lie in the High Court and a direction was given to the defendant to present the appeal in the proper Court within a week therefrom. The appeal was then filed on 20-9-1980 in the Court of District Judge, Bhatinda. It was on these facts that the petitioner submitted that there existed sufficient cause for not filing the appeal within the period of limitation and delay in filing the appeal deserved to be condoned. The said application and also the appeal had been dismissed by the lower appellate Court. 4. According to Shri Kashmir Singh, the learned counsel for the petitioner, Punjab Ordinance No. 1 of 1980 enhanced the pecuniary jurisdiction of the District Courts from Rs. The said application and also the appeal had been dismissed by the lower appellate Court. 4. According to Shri Kashmir Singh, the learned counsel for the petitioner, Punjab Ordinance No. 1 of 1980 enhanced the pecuniary jurisdiction of the District Courts from Rs. 20,000.00 to Rs.5 lacs and this was interpreted by a Division Bench of this Court wherein it was held vide judgment dated 9-4-1980 that it is not retrospective and the first appeals in the suits instituted before 9-1-1980 would lie to the High Court. In the meantime, Act No.5 of 1980 was published in the Punjab Government Gazette dated 28-7-1980 which was not in the knowledge of the counsel for the petitioner at Chandigarh and, therefore, the appeal was filed in the High Court on 15-9-1980, but the Registry of the High Court returned the same on 19-9-1980 and immediately thereafter the appeal was filed before the District Judge on 20-9-1980 along with an application seeking condonation of delay. According to the learned counsel, Ordinance No.1 of 1980, the judgment of the High Court interpreting the same and passing of the Act No.5 of 1980 caused a lot of confusion in a number of cases and the delay in filing the appeal before the lower appellate Court had occasioned due to the aforesaid facts. The counsel further submitted that the appellate Court had erred in rejecting the application for condonation of delay on the ground that the appeal, which was filed in the High Court on 15-9-1980, was beyond limitation. The counsel submitted that in fact, after excluding the time spent by the petitioner in obtaining the certified copy of the judgment and the decree of the trial Court, the appeal could be filed up to 15-9-1980 in the High Court as 13th and 14th of September, 1980 were holidays in the High Court. The argument of the learned counsel for the petitioner was controverted by Mr. R. L. Gupta, learned counsel for the respondent who submitted that the appeal filed by the petitioner in the High Court on 15-9-1980 was beyond limitation and therefore, the appellate Court has rightly rejected the application for condonation of delay in filing the appeal. The argument of the learned counsel for the petitioner was controverted by Mr. R. L. Gupta, learned counsel for the respondent who submitted that the appeal filed by the petitioner in the High Court on 15-9-1980 was beyond limitation and therefore, the appellate Court has rightly rejected the application for condonation of delay in filing the appeal. The next argument of the learned counsel for the respondent was that the plea that the appeal which had been filed in this Court on 15-9-1980, was within limitation, had not been taken in the grounds of revision before this Court. The counsel thus submitted that no sufficient cause had been shown by the petitioner for condonation of delay in filing the appeal before the lower appellate Court. 5. It was next contended by Mr. Gupta that the petitioner had a remedy by way of appeal and the present revision petition was not maintainable. Mr. Gupta, placed reliance on a judgment of learned single Judge of Orissa High Court in Bhagirathi Padhan V/s. Achuta Padhan, AIR 1965 Orissa 193 and also a Division Bench judgment of the said High Court in Banwarilal Bhoid V/s. P. Neelkantham AIR 1965 Orissa 102 in support of his submission. 6. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the records and the case law cited at the Bar. In this case, the judgment and decree was passed by the trial Court on 30-1-1980 and the copy thereof was applied on 5-2-1980 and the same was prepared on 21-6-1980. Therefore, 90 days for filing the appeal in the High Court came upto 14-9-1980. In order to verify the submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner that 13th and 14th of September, 1980 were holidays in the Registry of the High Court, an information was sought from the General Branch of this Court. The Superintendent of the General Branch has produced a copy of notification No. 336-Genl. /XVII. 3(a) dated 8-12-1979 issued by this Court as published in Chandigarh Administration Gazette dated 1-1-1980 and a perusal thereof showed that 13th and 14th of September, 1980 were holidays in the Registry of the High Court. The copy of the said notification is taken on record. /XVII. 3(a) dated 8-12-1979 issued by this Court as published in Chandigarh Administration Gazette dated 1-1-1980 and a perusal thereof showed that 13th and 14th of September, 1980 were holidays in the Registry of the High Court. The copy of the said notification is taken on record. As stated above, the limitation for filing the appeal in this Court had expired on 14-9-1980 which was a holiday being Sunday and, therefore, the appeal could be filed on the day when the Court reopened, in view of Section 4 of the Act. Thus, the appeal filed by the petitioner in this Court on 15-9-1980 was within limitation. Learned lower appellate Court was thus not right in observing that the appeal which had been filed on 15-9-1980 in this Court, was beyond limitation and there was no sufficient cause shown by the counsel for the petitioner for condoning the said delay. There is an error apparent on the record in exercise of jurisdiction by the lower appellate Court. The argument of the learned counsel for the petitioner is purely legal and he cannot be prevented from raising the same in this revision petition. The argument of the learned counsel for the respondent that no sufficient cause had been shown for condoning the said delay is without any merit and is thus rejected. 7. Now adverting to the legal submission raised by the counsel for the respondent that while dismissing the appeal as time barred, the judgment passed by the District Judge was appealable in view of judgments of Orissa High Court in Bhagirathi Padhan case : (AIR 1965 Orissa 193) (supra) should not detain this Court for long. Section 2(2) of the Code which defines "decree", reads as under :- "decree" means the formal expression of an adjudication which, so far as regards the Court expressing it, conclusively determines the rights of the parties with regard to all or any of the matters in controversy in the suit and may be either preliminary or final. It shall be deemed to include the rejection of a plaint and the determination of any question within Section 144, but shall not include- (a) any adjudication from which an appeal lies as an appeal from an order, or (b) any order of dismissal for default. Explanation.- A decree is preliminary when further proceedings have to be taken before the suit can be completely disposed of. Explanation.- A decree is preliminary when further proceedings have to be taken before the suit can be completely disposed of. It is final when such adjudication completely disposes of the suit. It may be partly preliminary and partly final." 8. The view expressed by the Orissa High Court in the two judgments noticed above that dismissal of an appeal as time barred disposes of the appeal finally, so far as the appellate Court is concerned and, therefore, it comes within the first part of expression of "decree" and against the appellate decree, it was the second appeal which could be filed and Civil Revision was not maintainable, has been overrulled by a Full Bench of Orissa High Court in Ainthu Charan Parida V/s. Sitaram Jayanarayan Firm AIR 1984 Orissa 230 in which it has been held as under : (Para 31) "we hold that an order rejecting a memorandum of appeal or dismissing an appeal following the rejection of an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act for condonation of delay in preferring the appeal is not a decree within the meaning of Section 2(2) of the Code of Civil Procedure." 9. Not only this, a Full Bench of Calcutta High Court also took the same view in Mamuda Khateen V/s. Beniyan Bibi AIR 1976 Cal 415 wherein it was held as under :- (Para 9) "An order rejecting the memorandum of appeal following the rejection of an application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act for condonation of the delay in filing the appeal is not a decree but an incidental order against which an application in revision under Section 115 of the Code may lie but no appeal under Order 43, Rule 1 of the Code can be preferred." 10. Even our own High Court also in Des Raj V/s. Om Prakash AIR 1986 Punj and Har 3 held in clear terms as under :- "An order dismissing an appeal after dismissal of an application under S. 5 of the Limitation Act for condoning the delay in filing the appeal is not a decree within the meaning of Sec.2(2) of the Code. It is true that the rejection of a plaint on the ground of limitation is a decree and that S. 107(2) of the Code provides that the Appellate Court has the same powers and performs the same duties as are conferred by the Code on the Courts of original jurisdiction in respect of suit. However, it is not open to the Court to extend the meaning of the word "decree" and include in it other kind of orders though they are similar to the orders expressly included in the definition. Consequently the order of rejection of the memorandum of appeal does not amount to rejection of the plaint and thus does not fall within the definition of the word "decree". "After taking into consideration the law on the point we are of the view that an order dismissing an appeal after dismissal of an application under S. 5 of the Limitation Act is not a decree within the meaning of S. 2(2) of the Code." 11. It has also been held by this Court in the abovesaid case as under : (AIR 1986 Punj and Har 3 at p. 8) "The above view was followed by a Full Bench of Orissa High Court in Ainthu Charan Parida s case AIR 1984 Orissa 230 (supra). The learned Bench, after noticing a large number of cases, observed that an order rejecting a memorandum of appeal or dismissing an appeal following the rejection of an application under S. 5 of the Limitation Act for condonation of delay in preferring the appeal is not a decree within the meaning of S. 2(2) of the Code. The learned Full Bench overrulled a Division Bench judgment of the Court in Banwarilal Bhoid V/s. P. Neelkantham, AIR 1965 Orissa 102, which relying on Rakhal Chandra Ghosh s case (1913) 17 Cal WN 807 (supra) had observed that dismissal of an appeal as time barred disposed of the appeal finally so far as the appellate Court was concerned and, therefore, would come within the first part of the expression "decree". We are in respectful agreement with the view expressed in the aforesaid cases." 12. We are in respectful agreement with the view expressed in the aforesaid cases." 12. The Supreme Court laid at rest the aforesaid controversy, in Ratansingh V/s. Vijaysingh AIR 2001 SC 279 where in para 11 of the judgment, it was held as under":- "In order that decision of a Court should become a decree there must be an adjudication in a suit and such adjudication must have determined the rights with regard to all or any of the matters in controversy in the suit and such determination must be of a conclusive nature. If those parameters are to be applied then rejection of application for condonation of delay will not amount to a decree. Consequently, dismissal of an appeal as time-barred is also not a decree. We are aware that some decisions of the High Courts have taken the view that even rejecting an appeal on the ground that it was presented out of time is a decree within the meaning of the said definition. We are also aware of the contrary decisions rendered by the High Court s on the same point. Dealing with some of those decisions a Full Bench of the Calcutta High Court (S. P. Mitra, CJ, Sabyasachi Mukherjee, J. (as he then was) and S. K. Datta, J.) has held in Mamuda Khateen V/s. Beniyan Bibi AIR 1976 Cal 415 that "if the application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act was rejected the resultant order cannot be decree and the order rejecting the memorandum of appeal is merely an incidental order." The reasoning of the Full Bench was that when an appeal is barred by limitation the appeal cannot be admitted at all until the application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act is allowed and until then the appeal petition, even if filed, will remain in limbo. If the application is dismissed the appeal petition becomes otiose. The order rejecting the memorandum of appeal in such circumstances is merely an incidental order. We have no doubt that the decisions rendered by the High Courts holding the contrary view do not lay down the correct principle of law." 13. In view of the above, the contention of the learned counsel for the respondent that revision is not maintainable, is devoid of any merit and is rejected. Consequently, the revision petition is allowed. We have no doubt that the decisions rendered by the High Courts holding the contrary view do not lay down the correct principle of law." 13. In view of the above, the contention of the learned counsel for the respondent that revision is not maintainable, is devoid of any merit and is rejected. Consequently, the revision petition is allowed. The impugned judgment dated 24-5-1983 passed by the Additional District Judge, Bhatinda is set aside and the case is remanded to the lower appellate Court to decide the appeal on merits in accordance with law. Since the matter is pending since long, the lower appellate Court is directed to decide the appeal as expeditiously as possible, and within three months from the date of appearance of the parties before the lower appellate Court.