There are mainly seven stages of any civil case. The first stage is filing. The second stage is the summoning of the defendant. The third stage is the submission of the reply by the defendant. After this, the fourth stage is when the issues are framed by the court. After framing the issues, the fifth stage is evidence. After evidence, the lawyers of the parties present their arguments and after that, in the final stage, the case is decided by the court.

Stages of Civil Case in India – A Complete Breakdown

In today’s blog, we will try to understand the civil case stage by stage, of which we have already written about the first stage i.e. the filing stage in the previous blog. After the filing stage, the second stage comes of summons i.e. when the case is filed by the court registrar, after that the court issues summons in the name of the defendant or defendants.

Summons is a call by the court to the defendant that this case has been filed against you and whatever has to be said from your side, you can come to the court and say it. The summons is sent to the defendant by the court with the summons officer and if a defendant does not reside within the jurisdiction of the court, then his summons can also be sent through registered post and if the defendant is not served by both these methods, then the court can also get it served by publishing it in the newspaper.

After service of summons on the defendant, the stage comes for the appearance of the defendant. The defendant gets 30 days from the date of service of summons to file a reply and if he is unable to file a reply within 30 days due to any reason and makes such a request to the court, then the court can give him a maximum of 60 days more time. Thus, the defendant gets a total of 90 days to file a reply.

Along with the reply, the defendant has to submit a list of all the documents on the basis of which he makes a statement in his reply or wants to prove his case in his favour. If the defendant raises any new facts in his reply which are not mentioned in the plaint, then the plaintiff gets another opportunity to respond to those new facts.

Which is called Jawabul Jawab in the language of the court and in common language it is called resort or reply. A situation may also arise that the defendant has received the summons but despite receiving the summons, he does not appear before the court. In such a situation, the court takes unilateral action against such a defendant and after the unilateral action is done, only the plaintiff is heard in that case.

And the case is decided on the basis of hearing the plaintiff. After the reply is presented by the defendant, the stage of settlement of issues comes. That is, in this stage, both the plaint of the plaintiff and the written statement of the defendant are read by the court and an attempt is made to know on which points there is actually a dispute between the plaintiff and the defendant. Such points of dispute are written down by the court.

And such points are called disputes or issues. It is on these issues that the court accepts the evidence of any party during the hearing and the court gives its decision on these issues only. After creating the issues, the court also takes opinion from the lawyers of both the parties and if any such issue is suggested to the court by any party which has not been made by the court, then the court includes such new issue in those issues.

After the issues are settled, the stage of evidence comes in any case. For evidence, within 15 days from the settlement of the issues, both the parties have to submit the list of witnesses whose statements they want to get recorded in the court to prove their case. After presenting the list of witnesses, the evidence starts during which first the statements of all the witnesses of the plaintiff are taken and then the statements of all the witnesses of the defendant side are taken.

For the statement of witnesses, the statement which is to be given by the witness has to be given by filing an affidavit and after the affidavit is filed, the lawyer of the opposite party cross-examines that witness, that is, he asks questions to the witnesses which can reveal the credibility of the witnesses and during that time, the lawyer of the opposite party also tries to prove the witness a liar and prove his case in the court. After the statements of witnesses from both sides are completed, the stage of argument comes.

During the stage of argument, the court fixes a date for hearing and on that fixed date, the lawyers of both the parties present their side in which both the parties present their arguments on the basis of their pleadings and statements. During the argument also, the plaintiff’s lawyer gets the first opportunity.

After the plaintiff’s lawyer finishes his arguments, the defendant’s side responds to it and if the defendant raises any new facts before the court during the reply, then the plaintiff’s lawyer can reply to them. After hearing the arguments, the court is required to give a decision within 30 days. If for any reason the court does not give a decision within 30 days, then the court hears the arguments of the parties again and after hearing again, fixes a date for the decision again.

Friends, the process mentioned in the video must be looking very simple to you and for this reason this question must be coming to your mind that if the process is so simple in civil cases, then why does it take so much time to settle civil cases? See, this happens because in civil cases, many situations arise during the case.

For example, if any one of the plaintiff or the defendant dies, then his legal heirs have to be brought on record on the file first and till they are not brought on record, the hearing of the case stops. Similarly, if any witness is unable to come to the court and give a statement due to old age or illness, then an application is submitted for recording his statement by appointing a commissioner in the court.

And then the hearing in that case also stops till the Commissioner’s application is not disposed of. Similarly, there are many other circumstances due to which different applications have to be presented in a civil case and on the presentation of these applications, the main process of the case stops and the applications have to be disposed of first.

Apart from this, the main reason for delay in civil cases is also the parties or the lawyers themselves because many times due to inability to prepare, adjournments are taken by the parties and lawyers and the more adjournments are taken, the longer the case gets dragged. How to get a quick hearing in any of your cases and what should be done so that the case can be settled quickly?

Read the full Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 on India Code

For this we have written a separate blog, you must read that blog too so that you can get your case heard quickly, it is not possible to tell about all the circumstances arising in a civil case in a blog, so if you have any question in your mind, you can ask me by commenting in the comment box below, in this way we came to know what is the general procedure followed in a civil case, stay tuned for such useful information, see you in the next blog. Jai Hind!