DASHARATH SUPADU LADSAKE Vs. GOPAL BHILA GADHARI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a second appeal from a decision of the District Judge of East Khandesh, raising a point of limitation. Unfortunately the respondents have not appeared, and therefore I have not had the advantage of any argument in support of the judgment of the learned District Judge which confirmed that of the learned trial Judge.

(2.) BUT the point is a very short one and depends entirely on the construction of the fifth paragraph of Article 182 of the Indian Limitation Act. The facts which give rise to the difficulty are these

(3.) NO doubt the decision is limited to the facts of that case in which all the instalments were due at the date of the earlier darkhast, and it does not cover a case, like the present, where the later instalments were not due. It may be contended that a darkhast cannot be regarded as a step in execution of a part of the decree which is not executable at its date, but one has to look to the actual language of Article 182. That article provides that for the execution of a decree time is to be three years from the alternative dates which are set out in the seven paragraphs in column 3. For a second application, like the one in the present case, there is no doubt that it is the fifth paragraph which applies, and that paragraph amounts to this that where there is an application made in accordance with law to the proper Court for execution, or to take some step-in-aid of execution of the decree or order, then time runs from the date of the final order passed on that application. At the date of the decision in Sitabai v. Keshavrao time ran from the date of the application, and not of the final order, but that, I think, does not alter the nature of the problem to be determined. The point to notice is that if there is an application to take some step-in-aid in execution of the decree, then time runs from the final order made on that application. It seems to me, on the language of the article, that if there is an application for execution of so much of the decree as is executable, that is a step-in-aid of execution of the decree and prevents time running in respect of the whole decree.