The Supreme Court has held that the mandatory 120-day outer limit under Order VIII Rule 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure, as modified for commercial suits, applies not only to a defendant's original written statement but equally to a plaintiff's written statement filed in answer to a counter-claim raised by the defendant.
The dispute arose after the plaintiffs, having faced a counter-claim from the defendants in a pending commercial suit, filed their reply to that counter-claim 238 days after it was raised — well beyond the 120-day ceiling that the Commercial Courts Act regime imposes on written statements. The plaintiffs argued that the strict 120-day limit, which the Supreme Court had earlier held to be truly mandatory (rather than merely directory) for an original written statement, should not apply with the same rigidity to a reply filed by a plaintiff responding to a counter-claim, given the plaintiff's different procedural position in the suit.
The Supreme Court rejected that distinction, holding that a counter-claim is, for this specific purpose, to be treated as a cross-suit — meaning the party against whom it is directed occupies, in substance, the position of a defendant answering a plaint. Since the mandatory 120-day limit governs a defendant's written statement without exception in commercial suits, the same rigidity carries over to a plaintiff's written statement replying to a counter-claim, and a reply filed after 238 days was accordingly held to be time-barred.
The ruling closes off an argument that plaintiffs facing a counter-claim had begun to raise — that their reply should be treated more leniently than a defendant's original written statement simply because of which side of the case caption they appear on. The Court's reasoning makes clear that the procedural posture created by a counter-claim, not the original party label, determines which deadline applies.