TMI Blog2011 (3) TMI 1478X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... cutta in C.O. No. 3608 of 2009. By the impugned judgment, the High Court has set aside the order passed by the Debts Recovery Appellate Tribunal, Kolkata (for short, the Appellate Tribunal ) in Appeal No. 35 of 2009, whereby the Appellate Tribunal, while allowing the application filed by the appellant under section 18(1) of the Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interest Act, 2002 (for short, the Act ) had exempted the appellant from making any deposit in terms of the second proviso to section 18 of the Act before entertaining the appeal against the order passed by the Debts Recovery Tribunal. 3. With the consent of learned counsel for the appellant as also the respondent-bank, which is on ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... appeal to the Appellate Tribunal, reads as under : 18. Appeal to Appellate Tribunal.-(1) Any person aggrieved, by any order made by the Debts Recovery Tribunal under section 17, may prefer an appeal along with such fee, as may be prescribed to the Appellate Tribunal within thirty days from the date of receipt of the order of Debts Recovery Tribunal : Provided that different fees may be prescribed for filing an appeal by the borrower or by the person other than the borrower : Provided further that no appeal shall be entertained unless the borrower has deposited with the Appellate Tribunal fifty per cent of the amount of debt due from him, as claimed by the secured creditors or determined by the Debts Recovery Tribunal, whichever is ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... that when a statute confers a right of appeal, while granting the right, the Legislature can impose conditions for the exercise of such right, so long as the conditions are not so onerous as to amount to unreasonable restrictions, rendering the right almost illusory. Bearing in mind the object of the Act, the conditions hedged in the said proviso cannot be said to be onerous. Thus, we hold that the requirement of pre-deposit under sub-section (1) of section 18 of the Act is mandatory and there is no reason whatsoever for not giving full effect to the provisions contained in section 18 of the Act. In that view of the matter, no court, much less the Appellate Tribunal, a creature of the Act itself, can refuse to give full effect to the provis ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... fifty per cent. to an amount not less than twenty-five per cent of the debt referred to in the second proviso. We are convinced that the order of the Appellate Tribunal, entertaining the appellant's appeal without insisting on pre-deposit was clearly unsustainable and, therefore, the decision of the High Court in setting aside the same cannot be flawed. 10. It is stated before us that in the notice issued to the appellant under section 13(2) of the Act, the debt due from the appellant as on September 25, 2006, was ₹ 52,42,474. Since in the present case the Debts Recovery Tribunal had not determined the debt due, we direct that on appellant's depositing with the Appellate Tribunal an amount of ₹ 15 lakhs within a perio ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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