Drafting of Review Petition →

A review petition is the narrowest of the post-decree remedies a litigant possesses: it asks the very court that decided the matter to look again, not because the loser is dissatisfied, but because something on the record is patently wrong or some vital matter was missed. The power flows from Section 114 read with Order 47 Rule 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, and for the Supreme Court from Article 137 of the Constitution. The drafting challenge is unique: every paragraph must persuade a bench that the threshold for review is met before it will even look at the merits. A review drafted like an appeal is rejected at the gate. This note walks through the substantive grounds, the procedural skeleton, and the clause-by-clause architecture of a review petition that an examiner or a judge will respect, anchored throughout in verified authority.

What a Review Petition Is — and Is Not

A review is a re-examination of a decree or order by the court that passed it. It is a creature of statute: a court has no inherent power to review unless conferred by law, and that power is conferred by Section 114 CPC, with the grounds and procedure spelt out in Order 47. The Supreme Court's parallel power rests on Article 137 of the Constitution, subject to rules framed under Article 145. Crucially, review is not an appeal. As the Supreme Court emphasised in Parsion Devi v. Sumitri Devi, (1997) 8 SCC 715, review proceedings "are not by way of an appeal and have to be strictly confined to the scope and ambit of Order 47 Rule 1 CPC"; an erroneous decision cannot be "reheard and corrected" in review, which "cannot be allowed to be an appeal in disguise."

This distinction governs everything about the drafting. In an original plaint the draftsman builds a cause of action; in a review the draftsman must first establish jurisdiction to reopen at all. The petitioner who merely re-argues the case, contending that an alternative and better view was possible, has already lost — Kamlesh Verma v. Mayawati, (2013) 8 SCC 320, holds that "mere disagreement with the view of the judgment cannot be the ground for invoking" review. For a refresher on how pleading discipline differs across instruments, see the introduction to this series and the Pleading & Drafting hub.

The Statutory and Constitutional Source

Section 114 CPC provides that, subject to prescribed conditions and limitations, any person considering himself aggrieved by a decree or order from which an appeal is allowed but no appeal has been preferred, or from which no appeal is allowed, or by a decision on a reference from a Court of Small Causes, may apply for a review of judgment to the court which passed the decree or made the order. Section 114 is the enabling provision; it is silent on grounds. The grounds live in Order 47 Rule 1.

For the Supreme Court, Article 137 states: "Subject to the provisions of any law made by Parliament or any rules made under Article 145, the Supreme Court shall have power to review any judgment pronounced or order made by it." The Court's own rules (now the Supreme Court Rules, 2013, Order XLVII) channel this power, and the grounds the Court applies in civil matters are substantially those of Order 47 Rule 1. A draftsman appearing in the Supreme Court therefore cites Article 137 as the source of power and Order 47 Rule 1 as the source of grounds — a point the petition's opening recital must capture accurately.

The Three Grounds Under Order 47 Rule 1

Order 47 Rule 1 permits review on three grounds, and the draftsman must pigeonhole the petition into at least one of them: (1) discovery of new and important matter or evidence which, after the exercise of due diligence, was not within the applicant's knowledge or could not be produced at the time the decree was passed; (2) a mistake or error apparent on the face of the record; and (3) any other sufficient reason. Kamlesh Verma v. Mayawati, (2013) 8 SCC 320, catalogues these grounds and the limits on each, and is the single most useful authority to cite in a modern review petition because it consolidates the law.

The draftsman should never plead all three grounds as boilerplate. A scattergun review signals weakness. Identify the strongest ground, plead it with particulars, and only add a second ground if it is genuinely independent. Each ground carries its own pleading burden, examined below.

Ground One: Discovery of New and Important Matter

The first ground requires the petitioner to plead three distinct facts: that the matter or evidence is new and important; that it was not within the petitioner's knowledge when the decree was passed; and that it could not have been produced earlier despite due diligence. The due-diligence requirement is the gatekeeper. Evidence that existed and could have been obtained, but was not, will not support review — the remedy is not a second chance to assemble a case that ought to have been led at trial. The draftsman must therefore narrate, with dates, why the material surfaced only after judgment and what diligence was exercised before.

A model paragraph reads: "That the Petitioner has, after the pronouncement of the impugned judgment dated ___, discovered [describe document/fact], which is annexed hereto as Annexure P-__. The said matter was not within the knowledge of the Petitioner at the time of hearing despite the Petitioner having made the following enquiries [particulars], and the said matter is important in that it [demonstrate materiality to the result]." Without the materiality averment — that the new matter would probably have altered the decision — the ground fails. The annexure discipline mirrors that of an ordinary plaint with annexures: each fresh document must be marked, paged and tied to a specific averment.

Ground Two: Error Apparent on the Face of the Record

This is the most frequently invoked and most frequently misunderstood ground. An error apparent on the face of the record is one that is self-evident and does not require a long-drawn process of reasoning on points where there may conceivably be two opinions. The classic articulation is in Parsion Devi v. Sumitri Devi, (1997) 8 SCC 715: "an error which is not self-evident and has to be detected by a process of reasoning, can hardly be said to be an error apparent on the face of the record." The Supreme Court in Northern India Caterers (India) Ltd. v. Lt. Governor of Delhi, (1980) 2 SCC 167, had earlier warned that a party is not entitled to seek review "merely for the purpose of a rehearing and a fresh decision."

What qualifies? An arithmetical miscalculation in the decretal amount; the court overlooking a binding statutory provision or a directly applicable judgment of a superior court; a clear misreading of an admitted document. What does not qualify is a debatable point of law, a re-appreciation of evidence, or a contention that the court drew the wrong inference. The drafting test the author should apply to every review ground is this: can the error be demonstrated by simply pointing to the record, without argument? If it needs argument, it is not an error apparent and the paragraph should be redrafted or dropped. Lily Thomas v. Union of India, (2000) 6 SCC 224, reinforces that the power of review "can be exercised for correction of a mistake and not to substitute a view."

Ground Three: Any Other Sufficient Reason

The residual ground — "any other sufficient reason" — is not a free-floating equity. Its meaning was settled by the Privy Council in Chhajju Ram v. Neki, (1922) PC, which held that the words must be read as meaning a reason "sufficient on grounds at least analogous to those specified" in the rule. The Supreme Court approved this reading in Moran Mar Basselios Catholicos v. Most Rev. Mar Poulose Athanasius, AIR 1954 SC 526. A draftsman who invokes this ground must therefore tether it to something analogous to discovery of new matter or error apparent — not to a generalised plea of injustice.

The contours have, however, been read with some breadth in particular contexts. In Board of Control for Cricket in India v. Netaji Cricket Club, (2005) 4 SCC 741, the Court held that "sufficient reason" in Order 47 Rule 1 is "wide enough to include a misconception of fact or law by a court or even an Advocate," and that a mistake on the part of the court can be a ground for review. Earlier, in S. Nagaraj v. State of Karnataka, 1993 Supp (4) SCC 595, the Court recognised an inherent justice-oriented power to rectify its own orders to avoid abuse of process or miscarriage of justice. The draftsman should deploy these authorities sparingly and only where the analogy to the enumerated grounds is genuine.

Limitation: The Thirty-Day Clock

A review application to a civil court must be filed within thirty days from the date of the decree or order under Article 124 of the Schedule to the Limitation Act, 1963. In the Supreme Court, the corresponding period under the Supreme Court Rules is thirty days from the date of the judgment or order sought to be reviewed. The draftsman must compute limitation precisely and, where the petition is late, accompany it with a properly pleaded application under Section 5 of the Limitation Act explaining the delay day by day.

Limitation is not a footnote. A review filed beyond thirty days without a sustainable explanation is liable to be dismissed on that ground alone, the substantive merits never reaching the court. The competent drafting practice is to recite the date of the impugned judgment and the date of filing in the very first substantive paragraph, so that the bench can see at a glance that the petition is within time. Where condonation is sought, the delay-condonation affidavit should disclose particulars with the same care a draftsman brings to verification of an interlocutory application.

Who May Apply and Before Whom

Under Section 114, the applicant must be a person "considering himself aggrieved" by the decree or order. This includes a party to the suit and, in appropriate cases, a person bound by the decree though not nominally a party. The application lies to the same court that passed the decree, and ordinarily to the same judge. Order 47 Rule 5 provides that where the judge who passed the decree continues to be attached to the court and is not precluded by absence or other cause for two months after the application, that judge shall hear it. This rule exists because the judge who decided is best placed to know whether an error was made.

The drafting consequence is one of tone. A review is addressed, in substance, to the same mind that delivered the judgment. The petition should be respectful, precise and free of the adversarial heat appropriate to an written statement or a memorandum of appeal. The object is to assist the court in correcting itself, not to indict it.

Procedure: Notice, Circulation and Disposal

Under Order 47 Rule 4, where the court finds no sufficient ground for review, it shall reject the application; and no review may be granted without previous notice to the opposite party, so that the respondent can appear and support the decree. In the Supreme Court, the default mode of disposal is by circulation: Order XLVII of the Supreme Court Rules provides that, unless otherwise ordered, an application for review shall be disposed of by circulation without oral arguments, though the petitioner may supplement the petition with additional written submissions.

This procedural default has a direct drafting implication: in a Supreme Court review the written word does almost all the work, because there may be no oral hearing at all. The grounds must therefore be self-contained, crisp and capable of persuading on paper. The petition cannot rely on counsel rescuing a thin draft at the podium.

Appealability of the Order on Review

The draftsman should advise the client on what follows the order. Under Order 47 Rule 7, an order rejecting a review application is not appealable. An order granting a review, however, may be objected to at once by an appeal from the order granting the review, or in an appeal from the decree or order finally passed after the review. This asymmetry matters strategically: a respondent who succeeds in resisting review has no appeal to fear from the rejection, whereas a respondent against whom review is granted retains a route of challenge.

Because rejection is unappealable in the ordinary civil hierarchy, the first review draft is often the litigant's last meaningful opportunity to have the same court reconsider. That raises the premium on getting the threshold pleading right the first time.

Review in the Supreme Court and the Curative Petition

Supreme Court reviews carry their own jurisprudence. The Court has repeatedly stressed that its judgments are final and reviewable only in exceptional circumstances — grave or glaring error or other well-established grounds — and not for rehearing. In criminal matters where a death sentence has been confirmed, the procedure was significantly altered by Mohd. Arif alias Ashfaq v. Registrar, Supreme Court of India, (2014) 9 SCC 737, which held that review petitions arising from the confirmation of a death sentence must be heard in open court by a bench of three judges, departing from the usual rule of disposal by circulation in chambers. A draftsman handling such a review must therefore plead for an oral hearing and constitution of a three-judge bench.

Beyond review lies the curative petition, a remedy crafted in Rupa Ashok Hurra v. Ashok Hurra, (2002) 4 SCC 388. The Court there held that it may reconsider a final judgment, even after dismissal of review, in exercise of its inherent power to prevent abuse of process and cure a gross miscarriage of justice — confined to narrow grounds such as a violation of natural justice or apprehension of bias, and requiring certification by a Senior Advocate. The curative petition is not a review; it is an extraordinary further step. The draftsman must not confuse the two: a curative petition that merely repeats the review grounds is liable to summary dismissal.

Structure and Format of the Petition

A well-drafted review petition follows a settled architecture. It opens with the cause title naming the court, the review petition number to be allotted, and the petition in which it arises (for example, "Review Petition (Civil) No. ___ of 20__ in Civil Appeal No. ___ of 20__"). It then recites the parties' description, the date of the impugned judgment, and an averment that the petition is within limitation. The body sets out, paragraph by paragraph, the specific ground or grounds of review with particulars, each error or fresh matter pinned to a page of the record or to an annexure.

The petition closes with grounds of review (often lettered), a prayer for review and consequential relief, and a verification. The drafting discipline of verification — distinguishing matters of personal knowledge from matters of information and belief — applies with full force, exactly as in the fundamental rules of pleading. An accompanying affidavit swears to the truth of the averments, and where limitation is in issue, a separate condonation application and affidavit are filed. Annexures are marked serially and certified true copies of the impugned judgment and the relevant record are appended.

Common Drafting Errors and How to Avoid Them

The most common fatal flaw is drafting the review as a rehearing — re-arguing the evidence and the law as though before an appellate court. Parsion Devi and Kamlesh Verma are routinely cited by respondents to demolish such petitions. The second error is pleading "error apparent" for a debatable proposition that in truth requires argument; the cure is the self-evidence test set out above. The third is ignoring limitation, or burying the filing date so the bench cannot verify timeliness. The fourth is invoking "any other sufficient reason" as a catch-all without establishing analogy to the enumerated grounds, contrary to Chhajju Ram v. Neki.

A fifth, subtler error is overstatement. Because the same judge often hears the review, intemperate language alleging that the court "failed" or "erred grievously" can be counterproductive. The skilled draftsman states the error neutrally and lets the record speak. The petition should read like a careful invitation to reconsider, supported by precise references — not like a complaint. Mastery of this restraint, together with the threshold pleading discipline, is what separates a review that is entertained from one that is dismissed in limine. For the broader pleading framework that underpins all of this, return to the Pleading & Drafting hub.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between a review petition and an appeal?

An appeal asks a higher court to re-examine the merits of a decision; a review asks the same court that decided the matter to reconsider on narrow grounds. The Supreme Court in Parsion Devi v. Sumitri Devi, (1997) 8 SCC 715, held that review is not an appeal in disguise and must be strictly confined to Order 47 Rule 1 CPC; an erroneous decision cannot be reheard and corrected in review.

What are the grounds for filing a review petition?

Order 47 Rule 1 CPC permits review on three grounds: discovery of new and important matter or evidence not available earlier despite due diligence; a mistake or error apparent on the face of the record; or any other sufficient reason. Kamlesh Verma v. Mayawati, (2013) 8 SCC 320, consolidates these grounds and their limits.

What qualifies as an error apparent on the face of the record?

It must be a self-evident error that needs no elaborate reasoning to detect — such as an arithmetical mistake or overlooking a binding statute or precedent. Per Parsion Devi v. Sumitri Devi, an error that has to be detected by a process of reasoning, or on which two views are possible, is not an error apparent and cannot ground review.

What is the limitation period for filing a review petition?

In a civil court the period is thirty days from the date of the decree or order under Article 124 of the Limitation Act, 1963. In the Supreme Court the period is thirty days from the date of the judgment or order under the Supreme Court Rules. Delay must be explained and condoned under Section 5 of the Limitation Act.

Can a review petition in a death penalty case be decided without an oral hearing?

No. In Mohd. Arif alias Ashfaq v. Registrar, Supreme Court of India, (2014) 9 SCC 737, the Supreme Court held that review petitions arising from confirmation of a death sentence must be heard in open court by a bench of three judges, departing from the usual rule of disposal by circulation in chambers.

What is a curative petition and how does it differ from a review?

A curative petition, evolved in Rupa Ashok Hurra v. Ashok Hurra, (2002) 4 SCC 388, is an extraordinary remedy filed after a review is dismissed, invoking the Supreme Court's inherent power to cure a gross miscarriage of justice on narrow grounds such as violation of natural justice or bias. It requires certification by a Senior Advocate and is not a second review.