K. BALASUNDARAM Vs. L. VADIVEL NADAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant has filed this Civil Miscellaneous Appeal to set aside fair and decreetal order dtd. 19/10/2016 in P.O.P. No. 158 of 2014 made on the file of Principal District Court, Tuticorin.

(2.) The facts of the case is that the appellants herein filed a suit against the first respondent to cancel the deed executed by them and to declare that the suit property belongs to them with consequential permanent injunction. For the purpose of filing the suit, a sum of Rs.1,29,450.00 were to be paid as court fee, which were unable to pay by the appellants. Hence, they filed Pauper original petition to declare them as pauper and accordingly filed P.O.P. No. 158 of 2014, which was dismissed by the Court below holding that they have sufficient means to pay. Challenging the said action of the Court below, the appellants are before this Court with the present Civil Miscellaneous Appeal.

(3.) The learned counsel appearing for the appellant would submit that without appreciating the evidence on record in a proper perspective manner, the Court below has wrongly passed the order. Further, the Court below had failed to consider that the Government of Tamil Nadu/2nd respondent who did not object the petition and they did not led any evidence either before the Court below or before this Court. That apart, the government alone has a say in this matter as to whether the appellants are indigent persons or not, for which, the appellants relied on a judgment reported in AIR 1988 Kerala 267, A. Prabhakaran Nair v. K.P. Keelakanthan Pillai. He also relied upon yet another judgment reported in AIR 2000 Rajasthan 32, Smt. Manjulata v. V. Sidhkaran. To sum up, he would submit that the Court fee is a matter between the appellants and the Court and in such type of matters, the contesting party has no role to play. Hence, he prays for setting aside the order of the court below and allowing this appeal.