SARDHARI LAL Vs. AMBIKA PERSHAD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE sole question in this suit is whether it is brought in time to satisfy the exigencies of the Law of Limitation. The plaintiff's ease is, that he was aggrieved by an order passed on the 31st of July 1880, and he now seeks to get rid of it in this suit. The order was passed in execution proceedings under the provisions of Section 280 of the Code of 1877, and the effect of it was to allow certain objections that had been lodged to an attachment obtained by the plaintiff in another suit in which he was plaintiff and decree-holder, and to release from attachment the property which at his instance had been attached and put up to sale. The plaintiff was entitled, under Section 283 of the Code, notwithstanding the order in question, to institute a suit to establish the right which he claims to the property then attached and put up to sale. But then it is provided by the eleventh article of the Limitation Act, Act XV of 1877, that a suit by a person against whom an order is passed under Section 280 of the Code of Civil Procedure to establish his right to the property comprised in the order must be brought within one year from the date of the order. Now this suit was not brought until the 20th May 1882, that is to say, about 22nd months after the date of the order. It is clearly therefore out of time unless it can be shown that for some reason or other the case does not fall within the article of the Limitation Law.

(2.) TWO reasons have been suggested why their Lordships should hold that the case does not so fall within the article. It is said that the article in question s aimed at orders passed against the persons who object to the attachment. But the answer is that it is aimed against persons who object to orders passed under Section 280; and it is not suggested that there can be any person against whom an order can be passed under Section 280 except the decree-holder himself. He therefore is the very person who by Section 283 is empowered to institute a suit to establish his claims, and who, by Article 11 of the Limitation Law, is confined to one year for the institution of that suit.

(3.) THEIR Lordships are clearly of opinion that this case falls within the scope of the eleventh article in question, and that the suit must fail upon that ground.