UNION OF INDIA Vs. DAYABHAI LAXMAN RAJKOT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In Small Cause case No. 348 of 1958, a decree was passed in favour of the plaintiff firm, a consignee of goods, against the Union of India Owning the Western Railway for damages in respect of deterioration of goods booked Bilimora to Rajkot. The consignor did not file the suit, but the consignee, in whose name the railway receipt was prepared, filed a suit fr damages. Admittedly, damage was caused to the goods.

(2.) The only point urged in revision is that the lower Court has erred in passing a decree in favour of a bare consignee and that as the suit was not filed by the consignor who was a party to the contract of consignment, the suit should have been dismissed, as it was a suit filed by a bare consignee against the Railway. The contention is well founded. This is a case of bailment of goods to the Railway. The word "bailment" is thus defined in Section 148 of the Indian Contract Act :

(3.) In the instant case, in his evidence the plaintiff did not say how he was in a position to sue the Railway for the loss or deterioration of the goods bailed to the railway by someone else. But the plaintiff merely relies on the railway receipt where his name is shown as consignee. The Small Cause Court, however, relied on a Full Bench ruling in Dominion of India v. Messrs. Gaya Pershad Gopil Narain, (S) AIR 1956 All 338 (FB), where it was held as follows: