DWARKOO Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellants/ petitioners have filed this application _ praying that the appeal be proceeded with and disposed of, without bringing on record unknown legal representatives of the deceased Bardoo (previously respondent No. 9).

(2.) The facts relevant to dispose of this petition may be briefly stated. Bardoo deceased was one of the respondents in this appeal. He is stated to have died on 9th March, 1979. After the appellants came to know about the death of Bardoo they filed an application (C.M.P. No. 728 of 1'979) for bringing his legal representatives on record. Since there was a short delay in filing the application, an application No. C.M.P. 729/1979 was also filed by the appellants to condone the delay. Both the applications were allowed by this Court. By an order dated 21st of August, 1979 Shri Sukh Dev alias Dev, was ordered to be brought on record, as the legal representative of the deceased. On 28th of May, 1980 Shri Arun Goel Advocate, appeared on behalf of Sukh Dev alias Dev, and made a statement that the deceased had disposed of his property by way of will in favour of some other person, and Sukh Dev has no interest in it. He further stated that the person upon whom the property has devolved be brought on record and that Sukh Dev was not interested in defending the appeal On 17th June, 1980, when the appeal came up for hearing, a preliminary objection was raised by Shri Inder Singh, learned counsel for' the respondents, thai a proper person has not been brought on record as legal representative of the deceased respondent. The learned counsel also contended that no steps were taken by the appellants to find out about the will, if any, and as to who was the legal representative of the deceased-respondent.

(3.) Arguments were heard about the present legal representative not being the proper person, and the record being defective. On that account the question arose whether the appeal as a whole was to abate or had become incompetent? The arguments on appeal were also started by the learned counsel for the appellants. We, however, noticed that in case the proliminary objection was to prevail there was no use of hearing the parties on merits. The learned counsel for the appellants also asked for adjournment.