JALIMCHAND SERAOGI Vs. GHANASYAM DAS MOUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a Plaintiff's appeal arising out of a suit for damages for malicious prosecution. The Plaintiff Jalimchand Seraugl is a merchant carrying on business with in the State of Assam. Defendant No. 1 is Ghanasyam Das Mour of Messrs. Gobind Deo Ghanashyam Das, Oil and Rice Mill, Karimganj and Defendant No. 2 is Abani Mohan Mazumdar who is manager of Defendant No. 1's firm. On the 16th October, 1948 a complaint was filed by Abani Mohan Mazumdar Defendant No. 2 against Mangilal Kaur and the present Plaintiff Jalimchand Seraugi in the court of the Sub -divisional Officer, Karimganj. In this complaint it was alleged that on the 12th August 1948 the complainant Abani Mohan Mazumdar on behalf of his master booked from his firm 135 sacks of 'sail' unboiled rice weighing 273 maunds 15 seers in a railway wagon for sale at Gauhati. On receipt of a telegram that rice of that class was being sold at Rs. 25/ - to Rs. 251/2 per maund at Gauhati at that time, he booked the goods.

(2.) THE Magistrate discharged the accused on the ground that no case was made out against any of the accused, it appears that thereafter the present suit was filed by the Plaintiff Appellant for recovery of Rs. 5,000/ - and odd as compensation for malicious prosecution.

(3.) IN the present appeal it has been strongly contended that the Defendants came at different stages with different cases and thus the prosecution was without any reasonable and probable cause and that it was malicious. It is contended that it cannot be said that merely because the Defendant had filed a case that the Plaintiff had actually sold the goods at the market price, this Court could reasonably come to the inference that the Plaintiff had committed a criminal offence. In fact the Defendant No. 1 is guilty of suppression of facts and if he knowingly suppressed certain facts from his complaint with a view to bring the case in a criminal court against the Plaintiff, there was an absence of reasonable and probable cause.