SHANKARANKUTTY NAIR Vs. UMA DEVI AMMA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Service complete. Heard. This appeal is against an order by which the court below refused to grant leave to the appellant to sue as an indigent in so far as the balance court fee payable in a suit instituted by him against the respondent is concerned.

(2.) While the appellant attributed his subsequent indigency to the fact that he lost his job in a Gulf country and has returned to India and is without any earnings, the fact of the matter remains that the court below did not address any of those issues. It rested rather on technicalities to hold that the application could not have been treated as an interlocutory one.

(3.) When 1/10th court fee due at the stage of institution of the suit was paid and the plaintiff thereafter faced a situation where he claimed exemption from payment of balance court fee, it is sufficient that the plaintiff files an interlocutory application. Though relevant rules require a verified petition to be filed; even in cases where a verified petition is a prescription in terms of the rules, if a litigant files an affidavit supporting such an interlocutory application; that would be in a pending suit and is hence maintainable, as being in substantial compliance of the rules, if the ingredients necessary for claiming such relief are stated in the affidavit filed in support of that petition. It would be too hyper technical to reject such a petition on a ground referable to the form in which such an application is filed. Substantial justice has to find its way forward, though without infracting procedural laws. This is more so because procedural webs are created to insulate the system from injustice. On the totality of the facts and circumstances of the case in hand, we see that this is a case where the court below ought to have proceeded to consider the merit of the contention of the appellant that he did not have the means to pay the balance court fee of Rs. 34,650/- due on the plaint. For the aforesaid reasons, the impugned order is set aside and the matter is remitted to the court below for further consideration of I.A. No. 1425 of 2003 in the light of what is stated above.