UNITED BANK OF INDIA Vs. RASHYAN UDYOG

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The only question involved in these two appeals at the instance of the decree-holder Bank is whether the Trial Court was wrong in not granting the pendente lite and also post-decree interest, while decreeing the two Suits giving rise to these two Appeals, warranting our intervention.

(2.) The Trial Judge, while decreeing these two Suits, said nothing about the pendente lite as well as post-decree interest and must, therefore, be held to have refused such interest and as has been made clear in the Memorandum of Appeal in both the appeals, the appeals are directed "against the portion of the judgment and Decree refusing pendente lite interest and interest on the decreetal amount till realisation".

(3.) Exaction of interest on loan, more often than not, operates harshly on the debtors. Our ancient Hindu Law condemned such practice. Vasista said (Vasista-Samhita, Chapter II, Versus 36-42) that "if destruction of foetus add exaction of interest were weighed in balance, the destroyer of foetus would go upon the scale and Usurer would fall down", and commenting on this, Dr. P. N. Sen in his Tagore Law Lectures on Hindu Jurisprudence (1918, page 300) said that "this figuratively expresses the Sage's opinion that extortion of interest which sucks the life-blood, so to say, of living men is even more reprehensible than the destruction of loess which has not yet seen light of the day". But notwithstanding such strong denouncement, Vasista could not declare it to be illegal but branded the Usurer as a "sinner who is lost to all virtuous acts". Narada also prohibited such practice for the Brahmins and Khatriyas, but conceded it for the Vaisvas, the commercial community, while characterizing such acquisition as "partly black (impure)". "The world", said Swami Vivekananda, "is in the third epoch under the domination of the Vaishvas (the merchant, the third estate)" and would continue to be so until the advent of "the fourth epoch" which "will be under the domination of the Shudras (the proletariat)".