HAKIM RAI Vs. GANGA RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal by the plaintiff and cross-appeal by the defendant arise out of a suit brought for the purpose of winding up the affairs of a partnership that existed many years ago between the two parties. The questions that the plaintiff seeks to have decided upon his appeal (apart from a question relating to interest) are questions whether in taking the accounts of the partnership certain items should or should not be allowed on one side or the other. They are purely questions of fact. It is not and cannot be suggested that they involve any question of principle whatsoever. Such being the case, they most emphatically are not questions that ought to be made the subject of an appeal to His Majesty in Council. It is true that the appeals concerned with only six out of a great number of items appearing in the account, and that two out of the six were very properly abandoned during the argument of the learned Counsel for the plaintiff. But that is not to the point. If four of such items are to be regarded as a proper subject-matter of appeal to His Majesty in Council, every such item in the accounts must equally be so regarded. It is not, in their Lordships' opinion, either right or proper that the Board should in this way be required to take partnership or any other accounts. If a question of principle be involved, it is, of course, another matter. But where this is not the case, the decision of the Court below on the various items of an account should, in their Lordships' opinion and for the reasons just given, be treated as conclusive unless the appellant can prove that the decision is beyond all question erroneous.

(2.) WITH these preliminary observations their Lordships turn to the facts that have given rise to the present appeals.

(3.) AFTER the passing of this decree the parties appear to have made an attempt to refer all matters in dispute to arbitration. But the attempt failed, and on March 10, 1920, one Lala Rallia Ram was appointed Commissioner to examine the accounts and report. He reported on May 22, 1921, finding that a sum of Rs. 7,363 odd was due to the plaintiff. Both parties put in objections to the report, with the result that on June 30, 1922, the Subordinate Judge reduced the amount due to the plaintiff by nearly Rs. 5,000. Both parties then appealed to the District Judge, and it was when the matter was before him on December 20, 1923, that the plaintiff at long last admitted that the Gujranwala business had in truth formed part of the partnership property. Why the Court had not found out this for itself years before is one of the many surprising things about this litigation. In order to wind up the affairs of a partnership property one of the first things to be ascertained by the Court is of what the partnership assets consist. But however this may be, the result of this belated admission of the plaintiff was, of course, that the partnership accounts had to be taken over again. The case was accordingly remanded by the District Judge for this to be done.