Report No. 193
Barring of judicial remedies:
The Schedule to the Limitation Act, 1963 lists various Articles providing periods of limitation for suits and applications, as stated in the First Division (Parts I to X), Second Division and the Third Division (Parts I and II). At the expiry of the periods mentioned therein, the judicial remedy gets barred while the right still remains. However, the right cannot be enforced in a court of law after the expiry of the period. The sole exceptions are (i) section 27 of the Act where the right itself gets extinguished in regard to property, moveable and immoveable and (ii) section 25, where a right of easement is acquired over another's property.
Section 3 of the Act states that, subject to the provisions contained in sections 4 to 24 (inclusive), every suit instituted or appeal preferred and applications made after the prescribed period shall be dismissed, although limitation has not been set up as a defence. The effect of section 3 (excluding the cases of acquisition of easementary rights under section 25 and extinguishment of title to property under section 27), is that at the expiry of the period mentioned in the Schedule in respect of the particular class of proceeding, the judicial remedy gets barred but the right still exists. The position was similar in England before 1984.
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