M NARAYANI AMMAL Vs. SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA IN COUNCIL, BY THE COLLECTOR OF THE CHINGLEPUT DISTRICT,

JUDGEMENT

(1.) On the preliminary objection taken by the Counsel for defendants other than 1st defendant that the suit was insufficiently valued both in respect of Court-fees payable on the plaint and for purposes of jurisdction, the District Munsif decided before commencing the trial that the plaintiff s valuation was correct. This decision was final as between the parties to the suit, subject to the power of a Court of Appeal to require an additional fee in a case of loss of revenue being occasioned by a wrong decision on the question of valuation (Section 12 of the Court Fees Act).

(2.) The District Judge was of opinion that the suit had been undervalued and that it ought, therefore, to be dismissed. In this he was wrong, firstly, because he applied Section 7, Clause V (a), of the Court Fess Act to these lands although the revenue from them is admittedly not permanently settled; secondly, because under Section 11 of the Suits Valuation Act he had no power to entertain an objection based on undervaluation to the jurisdiction of the District Munsif s Court, unless for reasons to be recorded by him in writing he was satised that the undervaluation had prejudicially affected the disposal of the suit on its merits; and thirdly, because the mere change of forum consequent on the alleged undervaluation could not of itself be treated as prejudicially affecting it wife Raghava Chariar v. Raghava Chariar 8 Ind. Cas. 545 : 20 M. L. J. 726 : 8 M. L. T. 404 and in any case the proper course would have been not to dismiss the suit but to return the plaint to be represented in a Court of competent jurisdiction.

(3.) The lands in suit were not actually registered as inam till after the institution of this suit. I consider, therefore, that the plaintiff when she filed her suit was entitled to treat these lands for purposes of valuation on the same footing that the Government was at the time of her suit treating them for purposes of revenue, namely, as ryotwari lands held on patta, and to value them at five times the revenue payable thereon under Clause V (b), Section 7 of the Court Fees Act. Neither the Government, who is 1st defendant having classed the lands as fully assessed ryotwari, lands, nor the other defendants, who have been paying such annual revenue to the 1st defendant, could now be allowed to take the objection that the lands were, as a result of their own act or acts in which they have acquiesced, wrongly classed at the time of suit.