LAL SINGH Vs. MUNSHI RAIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners have invoked the revisional jurisdiction of this Court under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure to seek the quashing of the order recorded by the Subordinate judge Palampur on 6 -4 -1931 in a pending civil suit, being Civil Suit No. 172 of 1977 and vide which the learned Subordinate Judge disposed of two of the issues framed in the suit treating them as preliminary issues. The short question involved in these proceedings pertains to the interpretation and scope of the expression debt as defined in Section 2 (f) of the Himachal Pradesh Relief of Agricultural Indebtedness Act, 1976 (hereinafter referred to as the Act).

(2.) This is how the question has arisen : the respondent -plaintiff instituted his suit out of which this revision petition has arisen against the petitioner -defendants for the recovery of Rs, 6,000/ -. The suit was based on a pronote executed by the defendants in favour of the plaintiff. The consideration of the pronote as per allegations in the plaint was the balance of price of fuel wood supplied by the plaintiff to the defendants and which amount was due on the date of the pronote and so admitted by the defendants,

(3.) It appears that the defendants in their defence inter alia pleaded that they were marginal farmers as defined by Section 2 (k) of the Act presumably suggesting thereby that the amount claimed in the suit already stood discharged in terms of Section 3 of the Act,