ADAPA SATTEMMA Vs. ADAPA RAMAYYA ALIAS TATAYYA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a revision petition under Section 25 of the Provincial Small Cause Courts Act. The petitioner was the plaintiff. She is the widow of a man named Narayudu, a son of the defendant. Before his death the family was living joint and the defendant was the kartha of the family. The deceased son and the petitioner had two daughters one of whom had been married before the son's death and the second daughter had to be married. It is not in dispute that the cost of the marriage is an obligation to be borne by the family and to be discharged by the defendant out of the income from the family property. The defendant, as kartha of the family, refused, or at any rate failed, to meet the obligation which occasioned; the plaintiff borrowing money to discharge the necessary expenses. Her suit was for a sum of Rs. 250 to be reimbursed by the defendant, the expenses to which she had been put. It is conceded that the suit is one under Section 69 of the Contract Act by a person seeking to be reimbursed by another in respect of payment of moneys which the other was bound to pay.

(2.) THE learned District Munsiff dismissed the suit, without any evidence being given upon a preliminary objection that it is not one which comes within the purview of the jurisdiction of a Court of Small Causes. In his judgment he observed that the plaintiff should have obtained permission from the defendant to expend the money, which she spent upon the marriage of the daughter and also that the plaintiff had no right to claim against the defendant in respect of unascertained or unestablished expenditure.

(3.) THE suit will 'be restored and remanded for hearing in accordance with law In any event the dismissal of the suit was not proper course to have been followed. The learned District Munsiff should have directed the return of the plaint to the plaintiff for presentation to the proper Court.