SITARAM COMPANY Vs. RATILAL RAMLAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Rule raises an important question. It involves the construction of Item 4, Clauses (iv) and (v), of the First Schedule, referred to in Section 5 (4) of the City Civil Court Act.

(2.) The suit in question was a suit, brought by the opposite party, for recovery of certain amounts, claimed by his as commission agent of the petitioner after accounting. The claim was laid at Rs. 7,000 and odd. In the written statement, an objection was taken that, on the above averments of the plaintiff, the suit was not entertainable by the City Civil Court and reliance was placed, apparently, in the written statement, upon Clauses (iv) and (v) of Item 4 of the First Schedule of the said Act, referred to hereinbefore.

(3.) The matter appears to have been argued before the learned trial Judge, more emphatically under Clause (v) and reference to Clause (iv) is not to be found in the judgment of the learned trial Judge. Under Clause (v) the suit, in order to come within the said Clause of Item 4 of the First Schedule, must be a suit, exceeding Rs. 5,000 in value, "relating to or arising out of transactions of mercantile agents, as defined in the Indian Sale of Goods Act, 1930." The learned trial Judge has held that, although, admittedly, the value of the suit exceeded Rs. 5,000, the plaintiff was not a mercantile agent, as required by the said Clause (v) and, accordingly, the transaction in question was not a transaction of mercantile agents with the consequence that the said Item would not apply. Upon that view, he has overruled the defendant's objection to the jurisdiction of the City Civil Court to entertain and try the instant suit upon the further finding that a part of the cause-of-action, admittedly, arose within the jurisdiction of the said Court.