SUKHLAL Vs. DEEPCHAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a defendants' certificate appeal against a judgment and decree of the High Court of the former State of Jodhpur, dated 5-1-1949, and was originally filed before the Ijlas-i-Khas of the same State and has come to us for disposal on the integration of that State with the State of Rajasthan.

(2.) The material facts may shortly be stated as follows. The plaintiff-respondents carried on the business of commission agents under the name and style of Ratanlal Simrathmal at Bombay. The defendant-appellants are members of a joint Hindu family, defendant-appellant No. 1 Sukhlal being the father and Nos. 2 and 3, Ranulal and Misrilal, his sons. The plaintiff-respondents' case was that under instructions from defendant-appellant Sukhlal, they entered into certain transaction's relating to the sale and purchase of gold, silver, groundnuts, linseeds, cotton and wheat, for and on behalf of the appellants in Smt. 1990 and 1991 as a result of which the plaintiffs were entitled to receive from the defendant's a sum of Rs. 9309/2/3 on Jeth Vadi 1, Smt. 1992 as principal to which they added a sum of 332/13/9 as interest up to that date and a sum of Rs. 740/ 8/6 as interest upto the date of suit, and a further sum of Rs. 6/- as notice and other incidental charges thus amounting to Rs. 10,388/8/6. The plaintiffs gave a credit of Rs. 111/15/6 on account of 2231/4 tolas of silver belonging to the defendants which lay with the plaintiffs and thus filed a suit for the recovery of Rs. 10276/9/- with pending and future interest at 6 per cent per annum in the Chief Court of the former State of Jodhpur on 24-8-1936.

(3.) Defendant-appellants Nos. 2 and 3 were impleaded as minors but became major subsequently and have filed this appeal as such. They filed a 'Jawabdava' through their guar-dian-ad-litem appointed by the Court to the effect that the business carried by their father Sukhlal was not a joint family business, and the debt incurred by their father, if at all, was not Supported by legal necessity or benefit to the family and appeared to, be immoral and illegal, and, therefore, they were not liable. Defendant-appellant Sukhlal contested the suit on numerous grounds. His main pleas were that the suit was bad for want of jurisdiction, as the cause of action did not arise within the limits of the court of the former Jodhpur State and also as he was not a resident of that State; that the transactions in question were of a wagering nature, and further that the business was entered into by him not as a manager of the joint Hindu family but in his personal capacity. The defendant also attacked certain individual items of business and he finally claimed that the plaintiffs should have given credit to the defendant in respect of certain items for their failure to carry out his instructions at the proper time, and in the net result, nothing would be found due from him.