VIJAYAN Vs. GRAMODHARANA SANGHOM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE short point pressed by the learned counsel for the petitioner is that the court has no jurisdiction to award compensatory costs under S. 35a of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 in an application for accepting additional objections to a petition filed for setting aside a court sale. The petitioner in EA. No. 1476 of 1975 who is none other than the second counter-petitioner in C. M. P No. 749 of 1959 in O. S. No. 369 of 1124, a suit decreed by the Munsiff's Court, Haripad, is the petitioner in this Civil revision Petition. In execution of the above decree, 40 cents of land belonging to the judgment-debtor was sold in court-auction. The decree holder who purchased the property sold the same to the petitioner and be took delivery of the same on 14 61968. The Sanghom who is the respondent herein, claiming some interest in the property sold, filed C. M. P. No. 749 of 1959 under S. 22 of kerala Act 31 of 1958. The petitioner herein filed his objections and thereupon the execution court dismissed the application. An appeal therefrom also met with the same fate. But in CRP. No. P1 of 1967 this Court set aside the orders of the courts below and remanded the CMP. to the execution court. After remand, the execution court set aside the court sale, but that order was set aside by this Court in CRP. No 1477 of 1974. This Court remanded the case again for fresh disposal in the light of the observations made in the order. It was thereafter that the petitioner herein filed E A. No. 1476 of 1975 which was disposed of by the execution court by the order impugned in this Civil Revision petition awarding Rs. 500.00as compensatory costs.

(2.) S . 35a of the Code of Civil Procedure which provides for compensatory costs reads: "35a. Compensatory costs in respect of false or vexatious claims or defences. (I) If is any suit or other proceeding, including an execution proceeding but excluding an appeal, any party objects to the claim or defence on the ground that the claim or defence or any part of it is, as against the objector, false or vexatious to the knowledge of the party by whom it has been put forward, and if thereafter, as against the objector, such claim or defence is disallowed, abandoned or withdrawn in whole or in part, the court, if it so thinks fit, may. after recording its reasons for holding such claim or defence to be false or vexatious, make an order for the payment to the objector by the party by whom such claim or defence has been put forward, of costs by way of compensation. (2) No Court shall make any such order for the payment of an amount exceeding one thousand rupees or exceeding the limits of its pecuniary jurisdiction, whichever amount is less: Provided that where the pecuniary limits of the jurisdiction of any Court exercising the jurisdiction of a Court of Small causes under the Provincial Small Cause Courts Act, 1887, or under a corresponding law in force in any part of India to which the said Act does not extend and not being a Court constituted under such Act or law, are less than two hundred and fifty rupees, the High Court may empower such Court to award as costs under this section any amount not exceeding two hundred and fifty rupees and not exceeding those limits by more than one hundred rupees: Provided, further, that the High Court may limit the amount which any Court or class of Courts is empowered to award as costs under this section. (3) No person against whom an order has been made under this section shall, by reason thereof, be exempted from any criminal liability in respect of any claim or defence made by him. (4) The amount of any compensation awarded under this section in respect of a false or vexatious claim of defence shall be taken into account in any subsequent suit for damages or compensation in respect of such claim or defence. "

(3.) IN the result, the award of Rs. 500.00as compensatory costs is set aside. The Civil Revision Petition is allowed to the above extent and dismissed in all other respects. There will be no order as to costs. . .