BAIJ NATH PRASAD Vs. HARNANDAN MAHTO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiffs are the appellants against the judgment of reversal. When the case was placed for hearing before the learned single Judge of this Court, namely, N. P. Singh, J., he referred this case to Division Bench by his order dated 22-12-1980, and the point formulated for decision is:

(2.) The facts are not in controversy. The appellants advanced a loan to the mother of the defendant. That fact is not denied. The concurrent findings of facts of the two courts below are that it was a case of a stray loan because the mother of the respondent happened to be a close neighbour and a 'Mausi' by village relationship as she had fallen in dire necessity of having such an accommodation loan.

(3.) It is admitted at all hand that if it were a case under the Bihar Money-Lenders Act, 1938, (Bihar Act 3 of 1938), as modified by the Act of 1939, (in short, 'the old Act'), Section 4 of that Act could not have stood as an impediment to the maintainability of the suit by the appellants on account of a bar imposed by Section 4 of the old Act. In the meantime, however, a new statutory provision has come into force, being the Bihar Money Lenders Act, 1974, (Bihar Act 22 of 1975) (hereinafter referred to as 'the new Act'), published in the Bihar Gazette Extraordinary, dated 29-4-1975. This suit has been instituted after commencement of the new Act.