HANUMAN PRASAD PRAGDAS Vs. P.S. NANJAPPA CHETTY AND SONS BY PARTNERS, P.S.N.M. CHIDAMBARAM CHETTY AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE defendant is the appellant. The appeal is against the decree and judgment of the learned City Civil Judge decreeing the plaintiff's suit for damages for a sum of Rs. 3,220. The plaintiff is a firm carrying on business at Madras, and the defendant is the manufacturer of brass circles at Mirzapur in the United Provinces. In the month of June, 1944, the plaintiff booked three orders for brass circles the particulars of which and the quantity of which have been detailed in the correspondence. There is no dispute regarding the quantity and the quality; nor is there any dispute between the parties that there was a concluded contract between them. They are at variance however regarding some of the terms of the contract.

(2.) THE defendant raised three questions in the suit and the same have been repeated in the course of the arguments here. The first question was that this Court had no jurisdiction to try the suit, secondly that the plaintiff repudiated the contract on 4th August, 1944, before a reasonable time had elapsed for the performance of the contract, as no period was fixed under the terms of the contract, and thirdly that the damages should be fixed with reference to the market rate at Mirzapur on the date of the breach and not with reference to the market rate at Madras.

(3.) APART from the question whether all the offers constituted one single contract or were different contracts, from the fact that the parties agreed that the railway receipt should be sent to the Bharat Bank, which in the context could only mean the Bharat Bank at Madras, against payment by the defendant, the Court at Madras has undoubted jurisdiction to try the suit. From this point of view the damages have also to be assessed according to the market rate in Madras, as the performance of the contract and the payment for the goods were at Madras and not at Mirzapur. The view of the learned City Civil Judge therefore on all the three points, in my opinion, is correct and he was justified in assessing the damages at the market rate in Madras and granting to the plaintiff a decree on that basis.