RADHABAI Vs. GANGO BAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a suit between two sisters. One of the sisters, the Plaintiff, got a decree for delivery of certain specific movable property (Jewellery etc.) but in spite of her prayer in the plaint the decree did not specify the amount of the value of the articles referred in Section 288, Local Code of Civil Procedure. I mean that the values of the jeweller or the amount recoverable as such from the Defendants was not decided by the trial court on account of insufficiency of evidence and the decree was passed simply for delivery of the specific property mentioned. In execution of the decree, on failure of the Defendants, the sister and her husband, to deliver those articles, subject of the decree, the court proceeded to value these articles for the purpose of alternative procedure for the decree -holder to recover the value of the Jewellery.

(2.) THE question for decision before me is whether the execution court is competent in a case like this to do something which was within the duty of the trial court. In the absence of any express provision to that effect, I would have been very reluctant to import any general authority in the executing court to add to the decree where the trial court disallowed that particular alternative relief for insufficiency of evidence. In that case, the Appellant's contention that the execution court is not competent to go beyond the exact limits laid down by a decree even into collateral or dependent matters would have prevailed. But here we have a specific provision of the Code of Civil Procedure dealing with a case of this kind and all those principles relating to the powers of the original court of trial and the execution court cannot be invoked to defeat a specific provision of law.