Interpretation – Three months – Does not mean 90 days – Bar of Limitation – Application filed on next day after limitation period due to holiday on the said date – Not barred by limitation.

An agreement was executed between the parties. The bills were submitted by the petitioner, but they were not settled. The Arbitrator was appointed and the award was passed by the Arbitrator in favour of the petitioner. On 28- 01-2008, the opposite party obtained copy of the award. On 29-04-2008, Arbitration Petition was filed by the opposite party before the learned District Judge, Bhubaneswar u/s. 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996. The opposite party filed objection to the said petition. The impugned order was passed on 18-08-2011 holding that the application filed u/s. 34 of the Act is within time.

The sole question that arose for consideration in the application is, whether the limitation of three months as provided in section 34 proviso to s/s. (3) of the Act should be calculated as ninety days.

The Court observed that in the case of State of H.P. and another vs. Himachal Techno Engineers and another,: 2010 SAR (Civil) 711, wherein the Supreme Court held that to equate 90 days to the expression of “three months” mentioned in section 34(3)of the Act is erroneous. The Supreme Court further held that a ‘month’ does not refer to a period of 30 days, but refers to the actual period of a calendar month. If the month is April, June, September or November, the period of the month will be thirty days. If the month is January, March, May, July, August, October or December, the period of the month will be thirty-one days. The Supreme Court further held that if the month is February, the period will be twenty-nine days or twentyeight days depending upon whether it is a leap year or not. In the aforesaid case, the Supreme Court further held that section 12 of the Limitation Act, 1963 provides for exclusion of time in legal proceedings.

The Court further held that section 9 of General Clauses Act, 1897 provides that in any Central Act, when the word ‘from’ is used to refer to commencement of time, the first of the days in the period of time shall be excluded. Therefore, to apply the said principle to the present case, while calculating the date of limitation, the date on which the copy of the award has been received by the opposite party i.e., on 28-01-2008 shall be excluded from computation of the limitation.

Therefore, computing the period of limitation from 29-01-2008, 3 days of January, 29 days of February (as 2008 was a leap year), 31 days of March and 28 days of April shall be included in the limitation. Thus, a total period of 91 days is the period of limitation for the present opposite party to prefer an application u/s. 34 of the Act. However, it was not disputed that the period of limitation ended on 28-04-2008. However, the application was filed on 29-08-2008. Therefore, it is seen that there is delay of one day in preferring the application u/s. 34 of the Act. However, it is not disputed that 28-01-2008 was a holiday, because the same was Lawyer’s Day, it is a holiday observed in the State of Odisha. Therefore, the application was filed on 29-01-2008 and is not barred by limitation.