The Calcutta High Court, has resolved the country’s oldest pending case after 72 years, in yet another example of the judicial system’s delays. This is also to noted that Calcutta High Court is India’s oldest high court.
Interesting fact here is that the Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava, who delivered the decision in India’s oldest case, was born a decade after the case was filed in 1951. The matter pertains to liquidation of erstwhile Berhampur Bank Limited.
Two of the country’s oldest pending cases, filed in 1952, are still being heard by the court. The two cases are being heard in civil courts in Malda, West Bengal. Hearings in the cases will take place this year in March and November.
The Berhampore case was also listed as the oldest in any Indian court in the National Judicial Data Grid. On November 19, 1948, the Calcutta High Court ordered the insolvent Berhampore Bank to cease operations. On January 1, 1951, a petition challenging the liquidation proceedings was filed and registered as “Case No. 71/1951” on the same day.
The insolvent bank was embroiled in numerous lawsuits to recover money from debtors. Many of these debtors went to court to contest the bank’s claims.
In September 2022, a hearing on the petition against the liquidation order was scheduled twice, but no one showed up.
The matter had been resolved in August 2006, but the information hadn’t been updated in the records, keeping the case on the pending list, the assistant liquidator informed the bench on 19th September, 2022 and today as of 16th January 2023 Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court Prakash Srivastava resolved the case finally.
