(CHAUDHRI) PAHUNCHI LAL Vs. BHUP SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against a judgment of a learned single Judge of this Court. A preliminary point has been taken that no appeal is maintainable inasmuch as the learned Judge who pronounced the judgment did not grant leave to file an appeal as required by Section 10, Letters Patent, as recently amended. It has further been urged that the rule framed by the High Court as regards grant of leave to file a Letters Patent appeal is partially ultra vires of the High Court.

(2.) It appears that the judgment was delivered by Ashworth, J., on 12 March 1929. No application to obtain a certificate to the effect that the case was a "fit one for appeal" was made before the learned Judge. An application was later on made before the learned Chief Justice of the Court in pursuance of Rule 6-C, para. 2, Chap. 3 of the Rules of the Court, and on his granting such a certificate the appeal was filed.

(3.) The contention on behalf of the respondents is that the rules framed by the High Court were made only to facilitate the filing of an appeal, but those rules could not in any way override the very Letters Patent subject to which the rules had to be made. The amended Section 10, Letters Patent of this High Court runs as follows: ...Provided an appeal shall lie to the said High Court from a judgment of one Judge of the said High Court...made on or after 1 February 1929 in the exercise of appellate jurisdiction In respect of a decree or order made in the exercise of appellate jurisdiction by a Court subject to the superintendence of the said High Court, where the Judge who passed the judgment declares that the case is a fit one for appeal...