DEVASSIA JOSEPH Vs. AUGUSTHI AUGUSTHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Both the lower courts have concurrently found that the petitioner is not entitled to benefits of Act XXXI of 1958 and he canvasses the correctness of that decision in revision.

(2.) There was a compromise decree in a suit on a mortgage, pending which other properties were also attached. Under the compromise decree the petitioner was to pay Rs. 3600/- on or before 30th March 1957 and the respondent, in the event of such payment, was to give up the balance. By the same decree a charge on the attached properties was also created. The petitioner failed to pay the amount in accordance with the compromise; but he filed an application under Act III of 1956 and he was allowed to pay the decree debt in instalments under the provisions of that Act. Subsequently, when Act XXXI of 1958 came into force, the petitioner sought relief under that Act. Both the lower courts, as already observed, refused relief under the later Act on the grounds that the petitioner was not an agriculturist as he paid basic tax of over Rs. 150/- per year and that the debt covered by the decree was one coming within S.11 of the later Act and therefore he should deposit in court one half of the mortgage amount before he claimed relief under that Act.

(3.) After Amending Act II of 1961 the payment of basic tax is no bar to claim relief under Act XXXI of 1958. Therefore the first objection, which weighed with the lower courts, no more subsists.