LAL SINGH Vs. RAMNARAIN RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by the defendant who is aggrieved by the concurrent decisions of the Courts below by which they had decreed the suit instituted by the respondents for recovery of the amount due to them on a hand-note dated 1st January 1935, executed by the appellant in favour of the plaintiffs. Upon the findings of fact, it is clear that the hand-note in suit was genuine and for consideration. Before the learned Subordinate Judge the principal point argued for the appellant was whether the account should be re-opened and the defendant relieved from the payment of excessive interest. The learned Subordinate Judge took the view that he saw no reason for it and agreed with the learned Munsif that in the circumstances of this case the transaction should not be re-opened.

(2.) It was then argued before the learned Subordinate Judge that if the provisions of Section 7, Bihar Money-lenders (Regulation of Transactions) Act, are applied, the plaintiffs are entitled to a decree for a much smaller sum, namely, about Rs. 1663-11-6 only. The learned Judge upon his interpretation of Section 7 came to the conclusion that the loan in the present case must be taken to be Rs. 2909-8-0 which was the amount for which the hand-note in question was executed and not Rs. 1000 which was the original sum advanced upon the hand-note of 12th January 1924. It is needless to state that the liability under the original hand-note was altered from time to time by the appellant executing fresh hand-notes after the accounts had been adjusted between him and the plaintiffs. It has been decided by a Division Bench of this Court in Sagarmal Marwari V/s. Bhuthu Ram A.I.R. 1941 Pat. 99, that the provisions of the Bihar Money-lenders Act have no application to a suit based upon a hand-note, and, therefore, it was contended by the learned advocate for the respondents that the question as to the applicability of Secs.7 and 8, Money-lenders Act, cannot be considered in the present appeal. We are bound to follow the decision of the Division Bench of this Court and would, therefore, overrule the contentions on behalf of the appellant. But it was argued that in view of certain observations made by their Lordships of the Federal Court in Subramanyam Chettiar V/s. Muthuswami Goundan A.I.R. 1941 F.C. 47 , it must be held that the decision of this Court has been overruled. I do not agree with this contention. All that their Lordships indicated in that case was that the observations of Meredith, J. that "the pith and substance doctrine" cannot be applied in construing the Government of India Act, 1985, were not correct. On the other hand, the observations of their Lordships in Surendra Prasad Narain Singh v. Gajadhar Prasad Sahu A.I.R. 1940 F.C. 10 , show that the view taken by the learned Subordinate Judge was correct. Sir Shah Sulaiman in construing the words loan based on a document observed at page 46: Presumably, by the expression "the loan based on a document" is meant the loan which has a document for its title-deed, on which the suit may have to be brought to recover it.

(3.) Varadachariar, J. took a similar view and observed at p. 57 that the document relied on should have been intended to embody the contract between the parties and should ex facie show a promise or undertaking to pay before it can be spoken of as a "bond".