SYED ASHFAQ HUSAIN SAJJAD HUSSAIN Vs. SANT RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) A suit was filed by the applicant in the Court of the Munsif. Rae Bareli, on the 30th of May, 1959 for recovery of Rs. 132-50 NP. against opposite party No. 1 and one Ram Chandra whose legal representatives are opposite parties Nos. 2/1 to 2/3 in this revision. As the suit was a money suit and was valued at Rs. 132.50 nP. and the learned Munsif Shri M. P. Tripathi at that time was exercising Small .Cause Court powers, it was registered before him as a Small Cause Court suit and would have been tried by him as such. Shri M P. Tripathi, however, was transferred and he handed over charge of his office in the afternoon of 8th June, 1959 before the suit could be decided and the post remained vacant for sometime. It was only on 13th July, 1959 that Shri R. B. Srivastava (sic) did not exercise Small Cause Court powers. A number of Small Cause Court cases however, were on the file of the Munsif, Rae Bareli when Shri R. :B. Srivastava took over charge. As appears from an order of the District Judge dated 9th December, 1959, he found that thirteen cases out of them had even been decided by him by that date and a number of cases were still pending. As Shri R. B. Srivastava had no Small Cause Court powers he was of opinion that in view of the Full Bench decision of this Court, namely, Bhagwati Pande v. Badri Pande, ILR 54 All 171 : (AIR 1931 All 574) (FB), those cases should be tried by Shri R.B. Srivastava as regular suits and he ordered accordingly. The case out of which the present application in revision arises its one of those cases.

(2.) Shri R. B. Srivastava tried that suit as a regular suit and granted a decree in favour of the applicant. Sant Ram and Ram Chandra, the defendants to the suit, made an appeal against that decree and that appeal was heard by the Civil Judge, Rae Bareli on 13th December, 1960. The appeal was allowed and the suit dismissed. It is against that decision that this application in revision has been filed.

(3.) There are only two grounds that have been taken in the application in revision, namely, that the law having given finality to the decrees or orders passed in all Small Cause Court cases, there was no right of appeal to go to higher Court and the appeal was not entertainable and secondly, as the appeal was not entertainable, the decree passed by the learned civil Judge was wholly without jurisdiction and unsustainable in law.