INDER BAHADUR SINGH Vs. SITA RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiff's application in revision under Section 115, Civil P.C. The applicant instituted a suit for the avoidance of a number of alienations alleged to have been made over a period of 14 years by one Sitla Baksh Singh, the karta of the joint Hindu family of which the applicant is a member. It was alleged in the plaint that these transactions were either without consideration or for insufficient consideration and that they were bad for want of legal necessity and also on the ground of immorality of purpose. There were 62 defendants to the suit, and one of the pleas taken in defence was that the suit was bad for multifariousness. The learned Munsif says: The result of this is that in reality the suit is not a single suit, but is a collection of a very large number of suits against a different set of defendants in each case and based on a different cause of action. To try all these suits together would be a most complicated and involved business, and as such, using the discretion vested in me by Order 2, Rule 6, Civil P.C., I find that all these various causes of action cannot be conveniently tried together...

(2.) The Court accordingly returned the plaint to the applicant with directions to institute a separate suit against each set of defendants. It is against that order that the applicant has come to this Court in revision. Order 2, Rule 6, Civil P.C., reads as follows: Where it appears to the Court that any causes of action joined in one suit cannot be conveniently tried or disposed of together, the Court may order separate trials or make such other order as may be expedient.

(3.) Learned Counsel for the applicant contends that where a Court orders separate trials under the provisions of the aforesaid rule, it should deal with the separate causes of action as sub-suits under the title and number of the principal suits from which they spring and should not order the plaintiff to file separate plaints and as authority for this proposition he relies upon Mt. Rutta Bebee v. Dumree Lal ( 70) 2 N.W.P.H.C.R. 158 and Khadar Sahib V/s. Chotibibi ( 84) 8 Bom. 616. Now Rule 6 of Order 2, Civil P.C., seems to contemplate causes of action which have been properly joined in one suit and in order to ascertain whether in the case with which I am now dealing it was competent to the applicant to join in one and the same suit the various causes of action against all these defendants it is necessary to refer to Rule 3 of Order 2. Rule (1) of Order 2 enacts that: Save as otherwise provided a plaintiff may unite in the same suit several causes of action against the same defendant or the same defendants jointly...