FIRM THAKUR DAS MARAKHAN LAL Vs. MATHURA PRASAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a defendant's appeal. The facts which have led up to it are to a certain extent not disputed. The plaintiff Mathura Prasad pawned three ornaments in Kartika Sambat 1885. He pawned them through his agent, the defendant No. 2, to one Manni Ram for Rs. 1,000. The loan carried interest at Rs. 0-14-0 per cent, per mensem. Manni Ram in his own turn Sub-pledged the ornaments to the defendant No. 3. Subsequently, two of the three ornaments so Sub-pledged were redeemed and were again Sub-pledged with the defendant No. 4. The plaintiff paid two items of Rs. 800 and Rs. 500 to the original pawnee, Manni Ram. As a portion of the debt remained unpaid he did not get back the ornaments. Then the Debt Redemption Act came into force and under it the amount of the loan got reduced because the plaintiff was an agriculturist. The debt got reduced to such an extent that the payment already made by the plaintiff satisfied it. The plaintiff, therefore, sued to recover possession of the three ornaments after redemption and contended that he was entitled to do so without the payment of any amount. He said that he was not bound by the Sub-pledges made to the defendants Nos. 3 and 4 and as the original debt had been satisfied he was entitled to get the ornament No. 1 mentioned in the plaint from the defendant No. 3 and the other two ornaments from the defendant No. 4. The suit was contested by all the defendants but we are not concerned now with the defences put forward by the original pawnee, the agent through whom the pawn was made and the defendant No. 4. The main defence raised by the present appellant, who was defendant No. 3, were that he was not a sub-pawnee but was a transferee in good faith, that the claim was barred by time and that the plaintiff was not entitled to get back the ornament that was lying with him because he was not the person who had really pawned it.

(2.) All these defences and those raised by the other defendants were negatived by the trial Court which accepted the plaintiff's case and decreed the suit. Defendants Nos. 3 and 4 went up in appeal, and the Civil Judge who heard the appeal dismissed it holding that the plaintiff had really made the pawn, that he was entitled to redeem, that the Suit was within time and that the defendants. Nos. 3 and 4 being sub-pawnees were bound to return the ornaments after the original debt had been satisfied. The plaintiff and the other defendants submitted to the decree, but the defendant No. 3 came up in second appeal. In that appeal he raised only two contentions. One was that the plaintiff's suit should not have been decreed because it was not within time and the other was that the plaintiff could not in any case get back the ornament that was lying with the defendant No. 3 without paying the amount due to him for the Security of which ornament had been pledged to him. Both these contentions were negatived by the learned single Judge who dismissed the appeal but granted leave to appeal under the Letters Patent. This appeal is the result.

(3.) The plea of limitation has not been pressed before us and the decision of the learned single Judge about that plea must therefore be held to have become final. The only question which the learned counsel for the appellant has argued before us is that the appellant before us could have either of two capacities. Either he was a sub-pledgee of the ornament that was in his possession or he was transferee of the pledgee rights of the original pledgee, Manni Ram. In either case the plaintiff could not get the ornament that was lying with him (appellant) without paying the amount which he had advanced on its security.