STATE Vs. K R SELVAMOORTHY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The defendant in the suit is the appellant. The plaintiff is the respondent. The plaintiff laid the suit for recovery of amounts deposited by him with the defendant under an agreement. That agreement was broken, and the defaulter was found to he the plaintiff. There was an earlier suit to maintain the agreement and that was dismissed; and one of the grounds of dismissal was lack of notice under S.80, CPC. The plaintiff relied on S.14 of the Limitation Act, stating that the earlier suit was prosecuted in good faith and the court, apart from other grounds, could not entertain it for want of notice under S.80, C.P.C. The case of the plaintiff has been countenanced by the two courts below. In this second appeal directed against the judgement and decree of the lower appellate court, the two substantial question of law formulated by this court at the time of the admission of this second appeal run as follows - 1. Whether in the light of the conditions in the tender form as accepted by the plaintiff, the plaintiff is entitled to recover the lease amount which is liable to be forfeited in case the plaintiff did not work out the have within the particular period ?

(2.) Whether the court below was justified in holding that the provisions of S.14 of the Limitation Act saved the present suit ? 2. So far as the first question is concerned, it has got to be answered against the defendant in view of the pronouncement of the Supreme Court in Union of India v. Rampur Distillery and Chemical Co Ltd., AIR 1973 SC 1908 wherein it has been held as follows -

(3.) Coming to the second question, it stands answered by a pronouncement of a Bench of this court consisting of Oldfield and Sadasiva Aiyar, JJ. in Kannuswami v. Jagathambal, AIR 1991 Mad 1071 (2), and Sadasiva Aiyar, J. observed as follow -