LIMITATION ACT, 1963
7.
13. Exclusion of time in cases where leave to sue or appeal as a pauper is applied for
14. Exclusion of time of proceeding bona fide in court without jurisdiction 6 15. Exclusion of time in certain other cases 6
16. Effect of death on or before the accrual of the right to sue 7 17. Effect of fraud or mistake 7
19. Effect of payment on account of debt or of interest on legacy 9
PART IV
PART V
MISCELLANEOUS
28. [ Repealed by the Repealing and Amending Act, 1974, w.e.f. 20-12-1974] 11
30. Provision for suits, etc., for which the prescribed period is shorter than the period prescribed by the Indian Limitation Act, 1908 11
31. Provisions as to barred or pending suits, etc. 12
32. [ Repealed by the Repealing and Amending Act, 1974, w.e.f. 20-12-1974] 12
SCHEDULE: Periods of Limitation 12
Limitation Act, 1963
[36 OF 1963]
An Act to consolidate and amend the law for the limitation of suits and other proceedings and for purposes connected therewith.
BE it enacted by Parliament in the Fourteenth Year of the Republic of India as follows:—
PART I PRELIMINARY
Short title, extent and commencement.
1. (1) This Act may be called the Limitation Act, 1963.*
(2)It extends to the whole of India 1[***].
(3)It shall come into force on such date2 as the Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint.
Definitions.
2. In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires,—
(a)“applicant” includes—
(i)a petitioner;
(ii)any person from or through whom an applicant derives his right to apply;
(iii) any person whose estate is represented by the applicant as executor, administrator or other representative;
(b)“application” includes a petition;
(c)“bill of exchange” includes a hundi and a cheque;
(d)“bond” includes any instrument whereby a person obliges himself to pay money to another, on condition that the obligation shall be void if a specified act is performed, or is not performed, as the case may be;
*Dated 5-10-1963.
1.Words “except the State of Jammu and Kashmir” omitted by the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019, w.e.f. 31-10-2019.
2.With effect from 1-1-1964.
(e) “defendant” includes—
(i) any person from or through whom a defendant derives his liability to be sued;
(ii) any person whose estate is represented by the defendant as executor, administrator or other representative;
(f) “easement” includes a right not arising from contract, by which one person is entitled to remove and appropriate for his own profit any part of the soil belonging to another or anything growing in, or attached to, or subsisting upon, the land of another;
(g) “foreign country” means any country other than India;
(h) “good faith”— nothing shall be deemed to be done in good faith which is not done with due care and attention;
(i) “plaintiff” includes—
(i) any person from or through whom a plaintiff derives his right to sue;
(
ii) any person whose estate is represented by the plaintiff as executor, administrator or other representative;
(j) “period of limitation” means the period of limitation prescribed for any suit, appeal or application by the Schedule, and “prescribed period” means the period of limitation computed in accordance with the provisions of this Act;
(k) “promissory note” means any instrument whereby the maker engages absolutely to pay a specified sum of money to another at a time therein limited, or on demand, or at sight;
(l) “suit” does not include an appeal or an application;
(m) “tort” means a civil wrong which is not exclusively the breach of a contract or the breach of a trust;
(n) “trustee” does not include a benamidar, a mortgagee remaining in possession after the mortgage has been satisfied or a person in wrongful possession without title.
PART II
LIMITATION OF SUITS, APPEALS AND APPLICATIONS
Bar of limitation.
3. (1) Subject to the provisions contained in sections 4 to 24 (inclusive), every suit instituted, appeal preferred, and application made after the prescribed period shall be dismissed, although limitation has not been set up as a defence.
(2) For the purposes of this Act,—
(a) a suit is instituted,—
(i) in an ordinary case, when the plaint is presented to the proper officer;
(
(
(ii) in the case of a pauper, when his application for leave to sue as a pauper is made; and
(iii) in the case of a claim against a company which is being wound up by the court, when the claimant first sends in his claim to the official liquidator;
b) any claim by way of a set off or a counter claim, shall be treated as a separate suit and shall be deemed to have been instituted—
(i) in the case of a set off, on the same date as the suit in which the set off is pleaded;
(ii) in the case of a counter claim, on the date on which the counter claim is made in court;
c) an application by notice of motion in a High Court is made when the application is presented to the proper officer of that court.
Expiry of prescribed period when court is closed.
4. Where the prescribed period for any suit, appeal or application expires on a day when the court is closed, the suit, appeal or application may be instituted, preferred or made on the day when the court re-opens.
Explanation.—A court shall be deemed to be closed on any day within the meaning of this section if during any part of its normal working hours it remains closed on that day.
Extension of prescribed period in certain cases.
5. Any appeal or any application, other than an application under any of the provisions of Order XXI of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (5 of 1908), may be admitted after the prescribed period if the appellant or the applicant satisfies the court that he had sufficient cause for not preferring the appeal or making the application within such period.
Explanation.—The fact that the appellant or the applicant was misled by any order, practice or judgment of the High Court in ascertaining or computing the prescribed period may be sufficient cause within the meaning of this section.
Legal disability.
6. (1) Where a person entitled to institute a suit or make an application for the execution of a decree is, at the time from which the prescribed period is to be reckoned, a minor or insane, or an idiot, he may institute the suit or make the application within the same period after the disability has ceased, as would otherwise have been allowed from the time specified therefor in the third column of the Schedule.
(2) Where such person is, at the time from which the prescribed period is to be reckoned, affected by two such disabilities, or where, before his disability has ceased, he is affected by another disability, he may institute the suit or make the application within the same period after both disabilities have ceased, as would otherwise have been allowed from the time so specified.
(3) Where the disability continues up to the death of that person, his legal representative may institute the suit or make the application within the same period after the death, as would otherwise have been allowed from the time so specified.
