KISSONDAS PREMCHAND Vs. JIVATLAL PRATAPSHI AND CO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an action the like of which I have never heard of and in support of which no precedent can be or has been produced. Counsel in the case tell me that one of the questions raised by it has not yet come up for decision in any Court. The claim in the suit is for a redistribution of the fund paid over by the Court to the creditors of a deceased person whose estate was under its administration, and it is made by one creditor who has not received his rateable share in the distribution of the fund against the other creditors.

(2.) The plaintiff was carrying on business in Bombay till 1927. He had entered into various transactions for the sale and purchase of cotton for April-May-December, 1926, and January, 1927, vaidas with one Noorani in Bombay. Noorani committed suicide on or about October 8, 1926. At the time of his death he was indebted to the plaintiff, as a result of the transactions, in the sum of Rs. 18,762-3-6.

(3.) Three days after Noorani's death, defendants No. 1 in this suit brought an action on behalf of themselves and all other creditors for the administration of his estate against his son under the provisions of Order I, Rule 8, Civil Procedure Code. The usual notices, as required by law, were published which, the plaintiff alleges, never came to his knowledge. On March 6, 1930, there was a decretal order of reference, which inter alia directed the Commissioner of this Court to take an account of the debts due by Noorani. In pursuance of this order, the Commissioner invited claims against the estate of Noorani. A notice for this purpose was published in the Bombay Samachar of July 1, 1930, and in the Times of India on July 2, 1930. The plaintiff says that this notice, too, never came to his knowledge.