PARUCHURU THIRUMALA SATYANARAYANACHARYULU Vs. VANNAVA RAMALINGAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners filed a suit in the court of the Subordinate Judge of Guntur for a declaration that they were, or, in the alternative, plff. 2 was the hereditary archaka of a temple. They paid a fixed court-fee of Rs. 100 under Article 17-A of Sch. II, court-fees Act valuing the suit for the purposes of jurisdiction at Bs. 3600. On an objection taken to the correctness of the valuation, the learned Subordinate Judge, after enquiry, found that the suit had been grossly undervalued, that the valuation of the property in suit exceeded Rs. 10,000 & directed the petitioners to pay an additional court-fee of Rs. 400. This order was passed on 14-3-1947 & ten days' time was given for payment of the deficit court-fee. The suit stood ad- journed to 24-3-1947. On that day the suit was called & as the petitioners had not paid the deficit court-fee, the plaint was rejected. The revision petition before us is against the order dated 24-3-1947 rejecting the plaint. Under S, 2 (2), Civ. P.O., an order rejecting a plaint shall be deemed to be a decree. It was therefore open to the peti-tioners to file a regular appeal against that order. AS an appeal was competent, it follows that the revision petition is not maintainable & must therefore be dismissed on this ground.

(2.) Mr. Venkatarama Sastri argued that though the revision petition as filed purported to be against the order of 24th March, rejecting the plaint, it must be deemed to have been really filed to revise the earlier order of the 14th March directing payment of additional court-fee. He relied on the ruling of the Full Bench in 'Murthi-raju v. subbaraju', L L. R. (1944) Mad 626 which held that a revision petition would lie to the High Court when a subordinate court has held that a plaint has been inadequately stamped. In that case, however, there was no order formally rejecting the plaint before the revision petition was filed against the order directing the plff. to pay an additional court-fee, it was urged before the learned Judges in that case that the petitioner before them could have waited till a consequential order was passed by the lower court rejecting the plaint on non-payment of the additional court-fee demanded & then filed an appeal. But the learned Judges observed:

(3.) The civil revision petition is therefore dismissed with costs. Viswanatha Sastri, J.