LIPTON INDIA LTD Vs. MOOSA A P M

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The suit which the respondent herein wanted to bring in forma pauparis was so clearly bereft of any cause of action and so patently barred by time that I think that, in allowing his application for the purpose, the court below failed to exercise a jurisdiction vested in it by law, namely, by Order, XXXIII R.5 of the Code which says - see clauses (d) and (d-1) - that the court shall reject such an application where the allegations do not show a cause of action or the suit appears to be barred by any law.

(2.) The respondent was in the employ of a company known as Lipton (India) Ltd. On information laid against him by certain officers of the Company in July 1952, he was prosecuted by the police for offences of criminal breach of trust and falsification of accounts. He was however acquitted by the court on 6-12-1957. Meanwhile he had been dismissed on 6-8-1952, and on 4-8-1958, he brought his present application under Order XXXIII R.1 & 2, the plaint wherein prayed for the following reliefs:

(3.) In the first place I might observe that the defendant respondent as named in the application is the Manager, Messrs. Lipton (India) Ltd. There is however nothing whatsoever in the body of the pauper plaint disclosing any cause of action against that person, and nothing to indicate that the company is being sued in his name. But since both sides seem to have regarded the suit as a suit against the company and not one as against its manager (although the present revision petition is brought in the name of the manager) I shall let the objection pass. Now, with regard to prayers (A), (B) and (C) in the pauper plaint, it is not pretended that the dismissal of the present respondent, even if it be wrongful, was in breach of any law. Although it is not expressly so stated, the pauper plaint proceeds on the footing that the dismissal was in breach of the contract of employment between himself and the company. If that be so, it seems to me that the only relief that the respondent can obtain, assuming that his dismissal was wrongful, is damages for breach of contract for which under Art.115 of the Limitation Act, the period of limitation is three years from the date of breach in other words from the date of the wrongful dismissal. And in so far as prayer (C) asks for salary accrued due before the date of the dismissal, the suit would be governed by Art.102 under which the period of limitation is three years from the date the wages accrued due. In so far as the suit is for wages due or for damages for wrongful dismissal it is clearly barred by time having been brought six years after the cause of action arose. And, in so far as it is for a declaration that the dismissal is void and inoperative and that the respondent is still in the service of the company and for a decree requiring the company to reinstate him, paying him back wages from the date of dismissal, it is bereft of a cause of action.