JAGAT DHISH BHARGAVA Vs. JALWAHAR LAL BHARGAVA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The short question of law which arises for decision in the present appeal by special leave is whether the appeal preferred against the appellants and respondents 8 and 9 in the High Court of Punjab by respondents 2 to 7 was competent in law or not. This question arises under somewhat unusual circumstances. It appears that an agreement of sale of one-third of the one-fourth share in the property covered by the document was entered into between Gokal Dhish Bhargava and the appellant, Jagat Dhish Bhargava. Gokal Dhish Bhargava sued the appellant and proforma respondents 8 and 9 for specific performance of the said agreement of sale in the Court of the Senior Civil Judge, New Delhi (Civil Suit No. 684/128 of 1949/50). This suit was dismissed on March 12, 1954. Pending decision in the trial court Gokal Dhish Bhargava died and his son Jawahar Lal Bhargava, respondent 1 and Chunni Lal Bhargava were brought on the record as legal representatives. After the suit was dismissed and before the appeal in question was preferred in the High Court Chunni Lal Bhargava died; thereupon respondents 2 to 7, as his legal representatives, joined respondent 1 in preferring an appeal against the said decree in the High Court of Punjab. The memo of appeal along with the judgment dismissing the suit and the taxed bill of costs endorsed on the back of the last page of the judgment was filed in the High Court on July 29, 1954. It is the competence of this appeal that was questioned before the High Court and is in dispute before us in the present appeal.

(2.) The record shows that on March 24, 1954, an application was made by respondents 2 to 7 (who will be called the respondents hereafter) for a certified copy of the judgment and decree passed in the said suit for specific performance. A certified copy of the judgment and the bill of costs was supplied to them but the decree had not been drawn up and no copy of the decree was therefore supplied to them. In the result the appeal was filed without the certified copy of the decree and only with the certified copy of the judgment and the bill of costs. On August 2, 1954, the Assistant Registrar of the High Court returned the memo of appeal filed by the respondents to their counsel and pointed out to him that since no copy of the decree had been filed t he presentation of the appeal was defective and the defect needed to be certified. Thereafter on August 16, 1954 the respondent's counsel refiled the appeal with an endorsement that a memo of costs alone had been prepared by the trial court and no decree had been drawn up, and so the appeal should be held to be properly filed. Apparently this explanation was treated as satisfactory by the office of the High Court and the appeal was registered as No. 77-D of 1954.

(3.) In due course the appeal was placed for preliminary hearing under O. 41, R. 11 of the Code of Civil Procedure before Dulat, J., who admitted it on August 30, 1954. Notice of the appeal was accordingly served on the appellant and the pro forma respondents. Ultimately when the appeal became ready for hearing it was put up on the Board of the Circuit Bench of the High Court to be heard on December 26, 1958. Meanwhile on December 23, 1958, the appellant served a notice on the respondents' counsel intimating to him that he proposed to raise a preliminary objection against the competence of the appeal on the ground that the decree under appeal had not been filed as required under O. 41, R. 1, along with the memo of appeal and the certified copy of the judgment. Next day, that is to say, on December 24, 1958, the respondents moved the trial Court for drawing up of the decree, but since the record had in the meantime been sent by the trial Court to the High Court no decree could be drawn up by the trial Court, and so the motion became infructuous. The appeal, however, did not reach hearing on December 26, 1958. On December 29, 1958, the respondents moved the Court that the appeal should be declared to be maintainable as the memo of costs which alone had been prepared by the trial Court read along with the concluding paragraph of the judgment may be held to satisfy the requirements of the decree; in the alternative they prayed that the record of the suit in the trial Court should be sent for to enable them to get a decree prepared with a view to file the same in the High Court along with their appeal. Bishan Narain, J., before whom this application was taken out for orders, directed that it may be heard by the Bench which would hear the appeal.