MT BIBBO Vs. RAI SAHEB GOKARAN SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiff's appeal arising out of a suit on a promissory note of 1922, the limitation according to the plaintiff being saved on account of certain payments and acknowledgments made by the defendant from time to time. The last acknowledgment relied upon by the plain, tiff was paper No. 53-C which the Court below has refused to admit on the ground that it was insufficiently stamped. The learned advocate for the plaintiff contends before us that although the document so far as it purported to be a promissory note was insufficiently stamped, the earlier portion of it which contained an acknowledgment of liability should be treated as such and should be admitted in evidence. Unfortunately for the plaintiff there is no evidence on the record to show that the original promissory note, which was not produced in this case, had even a one anna stamp affixed to it. Only a copy of it has been produced in this case which does not show that the original bore any stamp. We may however for the purpose of this appeal assume that a one anna stamp was affixed to it.

(2.) The document is in the following terms : My dear Lala Kanhaiya Lal, Whereas Rs. 5,300 half of which is Rs. 2,650, have been found due from me on account of a promissory note dated 20 December 1922 executed by Mukat Singh on the back whereof payment is endorsed in my handwriting, I promise to pay the said amount due to you together with interest at the rate of 1 per cent, per mensem within three months. I have therefore executed this promissory note so that it may serve as evidence. Dated 24 July 1928.

(3.) Below this appears the signature of the executant Mukat Singh. The learned advocate for the plaintiff has strongly urged before us that this document should be split up into two parts and treated as if it were two instruments written on one paper : first, a written acknowledgment signed by Mukat Singh, and the other as a promissory note executed by him, although it is only one document; it bears only one date and contains only one signature. In support of this contention he has relied on certain early English cases before the Stamp Act in England was amended in 1891. In 1849 the House of Lords had to decide a somewhat similar question in Kenneth Matheson V/s. Alexander Ross (1849) 9 E.R. 1101. In that case the document was a long debtor and creditor account, with items on both sides in a tabular form with the final balance noted. The document which formed part of the same half sheet of paper contained at the end an acknowledgment of the receipt of ?68 9s id, being balance amount of pay-bills paid, etc., and was signed by the executant. So far as the statement of the account was concerned, no stamp duty was chargeable on it, but there was a duty payable on the acknowledgment. It was held by the House of Lords that the document could be split up into two parts, the first of which not being chargeable with duty could be received in evidence in proof of the state of the account between the parties although the last portion could not be used in evidence as an acknowledgment. Later in 1852 a document containing all the requisites to make it a valid contract, and purporting to be a receipt, though inadmissible as such by reason of its being insufficiently stamped, came up for consideration before the Lord Chancellor. It was held that it could be received as evidence of the contract though not as evidence of the receipt itself. Lastly in Rutty V/s. Benthall (1867) 2 P.C. 488, a document containing the assent of the creditors also contained a recital empowering a third person to execute the deed for the creditor, but was not stamped as a power of attorney. It was held that the document could be used in evidence for the purpose of proving that the creditor had given his assent to the matter. In 1891 the English Stamp Act was amended and the amended section provided that ...an instrument executed in any part of the United Kingdom, or relating...to any matter or thing done or to be done, in any part of the United Kingdom, shall not, except in criminal proceedings, be given in evidence, or be available for any purpose whatsoever, unless it is duly stamped in accordance with the law in force at the time when it was first executed.