KANHAYA LAL Vs. NATIONAL BANK OF INDIA LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In order to render plain the nature of the question involved in the present appeal it will be necessary to make a short reference to the history of the litigation between the parties. It furnishes abundant matter for regret. The suit was brought on the 28th August 1902, and owing to the procedure adopted it will be found that at the present date the matter is but little more advanced than it was ten years ago in spite of the fact that large sums must have been expended in the costs of the proceedings in the meantime.

(2.) The facts of the case, so far as they are relevant to the question involved in the appeal, are very simple. On the 15 the August 1902 the defendant Bank which had obtained a decree against the Delhi Cotton Mills Co. Ld., obtained an attachment against certain mills at Sabzi Mandi, and on the 20th August 1902 took possession of them to obtain satisfaction for a sum of Rs. 83,005, the balance then unpaid under such decree. In his plaint the plaintiff states that he was the sole proprietor of such mills and of their contents. On thus being ousted from his property he took the course of paying under protest the sum claimed. Having thus freed his property from the attachment he at once brought the present action claiming a return of the money so paid and damages for the alleged illegal acts of the defendants.

(3.) In reply to the above plaint the respondent Bank filed certain preliminary pleas relating to the claim for the return of the money paid under protest, of which it is only necessary to cite the first, which was that " the suit as framed will not lie." It is admitted that this plea is in substance identical with the more usual form of plea, viz., that " the plaint discloses no cause of action."