U P AGRICULTURAL UNIVERSITY Vs. S C GUPTA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a plaintiff's second appeal in a suit for recovery of Rs. 859. 13 p., said to have been over-drawn by the defendant-respondent, during the period 1st June, 1962 to 24th July, 1964 as excess dearness allowance. The plaintiff is the U. P. Agricultural University, Pantnagar, district Nainital, and the defendant-respondent was at the material time employed as Assistant Comptroller in the office of the plaintiff University. The suit was decreed by the trial court but on appeal by the defendant, it was dismissed by the District Court of Kumaon.

(2.) ON hearing the facts of the esse I felt that the appeal was barred by Section 102 of the Code of Civil Procedure as it then stood when the suit was filed, inasmuch as the claim in the suit was of the nature cognizable by a court of Small Causes and the amount of the claim did not exceed Rs. 1000/-. When I put this objection to the maintainability of the appeal to the learned counsel for the appellant, he took time to study the matter. Today when the appeal was taken up again, he first urged that the suit was one concerning an act of an officer of the Government in his official capacity, but when it was pointed out to him that if it was so, a notice under Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure would have been necessary before filing the suit, learned counsel stated that the plaintiff was not a department of the Government, but a statutory body, and also that the defendant-respondent being at the relevant time employed as a servant of the plaintiff University, his act of over drawing his salary could not be said to be an act done by a Public Officer and that, therefore, a notice under Section 80 is not necessary. It follows that the suit could not be exempted from the cognizance of the Court of Small Causes under Article 3 of the Second Schedule to the Provincial Small Causes Court's Act. Learned counsel then urged that the suit was a suit for accounts inasmuch as the claim was for a sum calculated to be due from him on an account being taken of the amount due to the defendant and that drawn by him This submission is based on a mis-conception of the nature of a suit for accounts. Learned counsel relied on the case of Puran Lal Ram Lal v. Damodar Das Parmanand, AIR 1937 Alld. 23 in this context. That case is of no assistance because on the facts of the present case, it is clear that the suit was not a suit for accounts being taken but for a specific sum of money. There could be no question of taking any account, between the plaintiff and the defendant, before arriving at the amount claimed to be due to the plaintiff. In the present case the recovery of a specific sum of money has been claimed in the suit. The manner in which the amount claimed is said to have been worked out by the plaintiff is not relevant for the purposes of determining the nature of the suit. The claim in the suit being for the recovery of a specific sum of money, it cannot be said to be a suit for accounts and cannot on that account be said to be exempted from the cognizance of the Court of Small Causes. It has not been shown to me that the suit was exempted from the cognizance of the Court of Small Causes under any other Article of the Schedule. I accordingly hold that the suit, being not of a kind specified in any of the Articles of the Second Schedule to the Provincial Small Cause Court's Act, it was cognizable by a Court of Small Causes, and the amount of the claim in the original suit being less than Rs. 1000/- the second appeal cannot be entertained because of the provisions of Section 102 of the Code of Civil Procedure as they stood when the suit was instituted. The appeal is accordingly dismissed as not maintainable, but in the circumstances, there will be no order as to costs. Appeal dismissed.