SHAH KESHAVLAL MOTICHAND Vs. ASSISTANT JUDGE JUNAGADH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition under Article 228 or under Article 227 of the Constitution of India, and it is filed by Shah Keshavlal Motichand. The relief which the petitioner has prayed for in this petition is that the Judgment of the Assistant Judge in Civil Appeal No. 237 of 1956, which is pronounced on the 19th January 1957, be quashed. A further relief which is sought by the petitioner is that the order passed by the Board reducing his (Petitioner's) dues. to Rs. 1954-8-4 for secured debts and to Rs. 1158-9-0 for the unsecured debts, be also quashed. A direction is sought from this Court to the Board that the Board should accept the debt which was admitted by the debtors and should proceed to pass the award on the basis of admitted debts.

(2.) THIS application raises an interesting point of law, and the point is whether the Board constituted under section 5 of the Saurashtra Agricultural Debtors' Relief Act, No. XXIII of 1952, is a Court within the meaning of the expression 'subordinate Courts' which occurs in the two Notifications, bearing Nos. LD/j/18-5 (l)-i and LD/j /18-5 (l)-ii, both dated the 23rd May 1958, one of which was issued under section 17, and the other under section 19 of the Saurashtra District and Subordinate Civil Courts Ordinance, 1948 (XI of 1948 ). The point arises in, this way.

(3.) OPPONENTS Nos. 6 and 7 applied for the adjustment of their debts under the Saurashtra Agricultural Debtors' Relief Act on the 14th Feburary 1955. In their application, the opponents Nos. 6 and 7 mentioned only two persons as their creditors, and those persons are the present opponents Nos. 3 and 4. On the 27th September 1955, the opponents Nos. 6 and 7 disclosed further that the petitioner and the opponent No. 5 Were also their creditors, and they requested that these two persons also be joined as parties to the application. The Board thereupon, issued notices to the petitioner and opponent No. 5 also. Thereupon, the petitioner filed his statement before the Court under section 18 (b) of the Act, and in that statement, he showed his dues at Rs. 7504-12-0. The opponent No. 5 did not file any statement, and, therefore, his debt was declared to be extinguished. On the 21st January 1956, it was found that the total debts due by the opponents exceeded Rs. 10,000/ -. The Board at Manavadar therefore having no jurisdiction to enquire into the matter, the said Board transferred the case to the Board at Junagadh. It is the petitioner's contention in this application that the transfer by the Manavadar Board to the Junagadh Board was not the one which was contemplated under section 12 (2) of the Act, and, therefore, the transfer by the Manavadar Board to the Junagadh Board was one without jurisdiction. At this stage, it may be noted that this objection was not taken by the petitioner when the Junagadh Board started to hear the matter upon its transfer to that Board by the Board at Manavadar. The Junagadh Board proceeded with the enquiry; in that enquiry opponent No. 6 admitted all the dues of the petitioner. Therefore, the Board thought it unnecessary to examine the petitioner for an explanation in regard to any of the items shown by him as due to him from opponents Nos. 6 and 7. The Board at Junagadh, by an order passed by it on the 28th September 1956, which order was passed without calling upon the petitioner to explain the items, disallowed certain items. It is the contention of the petitioner that the Board did not correctly appreciate the accounts which were submitted before it, and wrongly believed that the petitioner had abandoned his claim for the amount of Rs. 5500/- which, says the petitioner, he had not in fact abandoned. Upon this contention, the petitioner submits in the present application, that the whole approach which was adopted by the Board in this case was an approach which was not lawful, and not warranted by the facts.