Request to correct the appeal instruction in ruling P.98/2024 — 13 March 2024

The dated submission and court receipt stamp identify the 13 March 2024 request to correct ruling P. 98/2024. The timeline records submission and receipt, not a court decision accepting the request.

[Receipt stamp of the Higher Court in Novi Sad: **“RECEIVED 13.03.2024”**]

The 13 March request sought urgent referral to the Basic Court. This later summons is issued by the Basic Court in P2.470/24 and names the same plaintiff, defendant and full-adoption-annulment matter. It documents the next court step, without itself proving that the earlier request to correct the appeal instruction was granted.

**BASIC COURT IN NOVI SAD** Dated **22. 03. 2024** **P2.470/24** ### SUMMONS TO THE MAIN HEARING **[redacted], lawyer** of Novi Sad is summoned as **the plaintiff’s authorized representative** to appear on **02. 04. 2024 at 8:15 a.m.** at this court, room number **210/2**, in the legal matter of the plaintiff **MILAN PETROVIĆ** of Kragujevac against the defendant **CENTRE FOR SOCIAL WORK** of Novi Sad, concerning **annulment of full adoption**.

The request identifies the Higher Court ruling of 26 February 2024 and states that counsel received it on 4 March. It contests the 15-day appeal instruction and requests correction and urgent transfer; this is the subsequent party submission concerning that ruling.

By its Ruling P.98/2024 of 26 February 2024, received by the plaintiff's counsel on 4 March 2024, the above Court declared that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction to proceed in this legal matter. It decided to transfer the case file, after the ruling became final, to the Basic Court in Novi Sad for further proceedings, considering that court to have subject-matter and territorial jurisdiction.

The request identifies the claim filed on 22 February 2024. It maintains that the Higher Court has jurisdiction while also requesting urgent transfer to the Basic Court and a certified copy of the corrected ruling. Both positions are preserved; the submission does not prove completion of the requested steps.

Therefore, although the plaintiff's counsel remains of the view that the Higher Court in Novi Sad has subject-matter and territorial jurisdiction over this legal matter, for the reasons set out in detail in the statement of claim, she does not wish to exercise a right to which she is not entitled by law and have her appeal rightly dismissed as inadmissible by the Court of Appeal in Novi Sad. If an oversight were to occur and the appeal were nevertheless decided, the question would arise of the validity of such a decision, delivered on an appeal that could not properly be decided. Time is being lost, and it is extremely precious in this case. In any event, if the Basic Court in Novi Sad does not raise a conflict of jurisdiction, there is a legally permitted way to review its decision accepting jurisdiction.

At the 24 April hearing, the plaintiff’s counsel stated that the correction request sent to Higher Court judge Biljana Lepotić on 13 March had not been answered. The original request allows comparison with that recorded statement and its disputed instruction on legal remedy and date of finality.

We sent Higher Court judge Biljana Lepotić a submission on **13. 03. 2024**, requesting correction of the ruling of the addressed court, **P.98/2024 of 26. 02. 2024**. In it, we set out and explained in detail why we consider that the judge handling the case should correct that ruling’s instruction on legal remedy and its date of finality. Yet, as of today, she has not responded to that submission. Instead, she sent the file to the Basic Court in Novi Sad for further proceedings, together with the ruling declaring a lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, case number **P.97/2024 of 27. 02. 2024**, upon which she placed the wrong date of finality, **20. 03. 2024**.

The 29 April ruling recounts the correction request of 13 March and the jurisdiction objection of 1 April. In its account of the plaintiff’s submissions, it records his statements that the request remained unanswered and that 20 March had been entered as the wrong date of finality. The original 13 March request permits comparison with this subsequent court account.

On **13 March 2024**, the plaintiff, through his authorized representative, sent a submission to the Higher Court in Novi Sad requesting that it issue a decision correcting its ruling No. **P.98/2024 of 26 February 2024** in the part concerning the instruction on legal remedies, by establishing that no appeal against that ruling was permitted and referring the case file to the Basic Court in Novi Sad, and that it serve the plaintiff’s authorized representative with a certified copy of the ruling correcting ruling No. P.98/2024 of 26 February 2024. On **1 April 2024**, the plaintiff, through his authorized representative, filed a submission with the Basic Court in Novi Sad in which he stated that he was raising a procedural objection to the Basic Court’s lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. He stated that, in its ruling No. P.98/2024 of 26 February 2024 declaring itself without subject-matter jurisdiction, the Higher Court in Novi Sad had incorrectly instructed the plaintiff that he had a right to appeal against that ruling to the Appellate Court in Novi Sad within 15 days of receiving it, whereas such an appeal was in fact not permitted under **Article 17(4) of the Civil Procedure Act**. He stated that, on 13 March 2024, the plaintiff’s authorized representative had sent a submission to the Higher Court in Novi Sad requesting a ruling correcting the ruling on lack of jurisdiction, establishing that the court had made an oversight and that no appeal was permitted, but that the Higher Court had not answered that submission. He then pointed out that the Higher Court had marked an incorrect date of finality for that ruling. He stated that, instead of 26 February 2024 as the day on which the ruling was issued, the Higher Court had determined **20 March 2024** as the day of finality, the day after expiry of an appeal period which could not even have begun to run because an appeal was prohibited by law.