JAINTI PRASAD Vs. NANAK CHAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a second appeal raising a curious point. On 4 March 1937 the appellant obtained a decree against the respondent for some Rs. 1600 and on 17 March he began execution proceedings against the respondent for the purpose of obtaining his arrest. On 8 April notice was served on the judgment- debtor to show cause why he should not be arrested and 16 April was fixed as the day for hearing that application. Two days however before the hearing, a sum of Rs. 825 was paid by the judgment-debtor to the decree-holder. It is not quite true to say that this sum was paid, because it was provided only as to Rs. 400 in cash the remaining Rs. 425 taking the form of a transfer to the decree-holder of certain property of that value. On 16 April, the day fixed for the hearing of the arrest-matter, the decree-holder did not turn up and it was dismissed for default. Pausing at that point, the inference is irresistible that the effect of the payment made on the 14 was that the decree-holder no longer pressed his execution application and was content to let it go by default.

(2.) The next thing that happened was that on 24 April, under Order 21, Rule 2 (2) the judgment-debtor applied to the Court to have it "recorded as certified" that be had paid Rs. 825 in full satisfaction of the decree, I pause to observe that it is a little curious that the judgment-debtor should have made his application at so early a stage. As I read the Rule, the normal procedure one would expect is for the judgment-debtor to apply only upon default being made by the decree-holder under para. (1). The order however in this case was inverted, for on 27 April, the decree-holder made an application under para. (1) of the same Rule certifying that the payment had been made and asking that it might be recorded as a part satisfaction of the decree. The combined effect of these two applications was obviously to raise a serious issue between the judgment-debtor and the decree- holder as to whether the decree had been satisfied or not. In due course, the Munsif of Meerut considered the matter and came to the conclusion that the Rs. 825 which had been provided were received by the decree-holder in full satisfaction of the decree. He came to that conclusion with the assistance of a receipt given by the decree-holder, which I shall have to examine a little more closely in a moment and of certain evidence given by the debtor and another witness to the effect that there had been an oral agreement between the parties that the judgment-debt should be satisfied by the Rs. 825. On first appeal to the learned. Second Civil Judge of Meerut, he took the same view and dismissed the appeal, agreeing with the Munsif.

(3.) In those circumstances, the matter has come before me in second appeal. I regret that I take a view which is different to the one taken in the Courts below. The point, though a small one, admits of two views. But I think myself that both the learned Judges in the Courts below were wrong in finding, on the materials before them, that the payment was a full satisfaction of the decree. I propose now to look at the receipt which was given. It is a document consisting of a printed form torn out of a book. It has five columns: one for the number, another for the date, another for the amount of money paid and the name of the payer, another for the purpose of showing on what account payment is made and the fifth for the signature of the payee. In the document, as filled up in this case, there appears in col. 2 the date and there also appear these words, which have given rise to all the trouble: "Received the whole amount." That is an English translation of the Urdu words "kul wasul paya." It does not, to my mind, matter very much whether you translate them as "received the whole amount" or "received the entire amount" or "received in full." Then in the next column are the words: "On account of one decree No. 442 of the year 1936...." followed by the title of the decree. The words "on account of" are a translation of the Urdu "babat," which possibly might more accurately be translated as "in relation to" or "in respect of." Then col. 4 says this: The sum of rupees eight hundred and twenty-five (Rs. 825). For the amount of rupees four hundred and twenty-five have received two sale deeds. Rupees four hundred (Rs. 400) received in cash. And finally in col. 5 is the signature and the stamp. Now what is said about this is that the words in col. 2 "received the whole amount" mean that the Rs. 825 which had been paid were in full satisfaction of the decree. I do not myself think that that is the natural meaning of these words in the context in which we find them. If they had been intended to mean that the Rs. 825 in respect of which the receipt was being given were in full satisfaction of the decree, not only would it have been quite simple to say so, but it would have been quite inaccurate to say that "the whole amount had been received." The very reverse was the case. The whole amount (meaning thereby the full amount of the decree) had not been received. The only thing that had been received in full was the Rs. 825. When therefore we find the words "received the whole amount," then, unless we are going to attribute something that is untrue to them, we must take them to refer to the only thing that had been received, namely the Rs. 825. But it is pointed out to me that there are the words "the whole amount" and it is said "the whole amount" must mean the decree. I do not think that that is necessarily so, if it be borne in mind that the sum of Rs. 825, for which the receipt was given, was not all paid in cash. Part of it was satisfied by the transfer of property representing a sum equivalent to Rs. 425. What I think the parties intended to express by the words in column 2 is that, notwithstanding that part of what was actually received was property, nevertheless the whole sum of Rs. 825 was to be taken to be received.