FATMABAI Vs. SONBAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) At the end of last term Mr. Lowndes appeared for defendant No. 3 and asked for a rule calling upon all the other parties to the consent decree to show cause why that decree should not be set aside on grounds of forgery and fraud

(2.) alleged particularly against the second defendant. I then intimated to Mr. Lowndes that I did not think any rule of that kind even if granted could be productive of any useful result or even could be made absolute, as in my opinion he had chosen the wrong procedure. Mr. Lowndes, while admitting that he entertained some doubt upon the point, pressed for the rule in order that it might be argued when due return had been made to it.

(3.) It has come before me to-day and has been well argued on both sides, Mr. Setalvad representing Mr. Lowndes; but I remain of the same opinion. Nothing that has been said in the course of the argument for defendant No. 3 has in the slightest degree shaken the opinion, which I was disposed to hold from the first, that a consent decree once duly obtained cannot be set aside by any rule of this kind, but if it is sought to impeach it upon grounds of fraud, that must be done in a regular suit. The only alternative which our law allows is an application for review of judgment, but such an application in the present suit would clearly be time-barred.