TUNNI LAL PATHAK Vs. SHANKER LAL PARBATIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a court-fee matter.

(2.) It appears that two persons, Tunni Lal Pathak and Bissi Lal Pathak, filed an application for leave to sue in forma pauper is; but before the application for leave to sue as a pauper was disposed of, Bissi Lal died. Ultimately, on the 18th December 1944, the application of the survivor of the two applicants to sue as a pauper was rejected. Tunni Lal's application for leave to sue as a pauper having been rejected he was, in the usual course, granted permission to pay court fee on the value of his moiety share in the property in dispute, and the plaint was treated as in respect of his own interest in that property. The suit was thus registered on payment of court-fee on 5 January 1945. On 13 January 1945, Tunni Lal made an application to add Mt. Annapurna Dai, Bissi Lal's widow, as a party-defendant to the suit. That prayer was refused by the Court on 22 August, 1945. On 28th August 1945, Mt. Annapurna Dai made an application for being added as a plaintiff to the suit. Her prayer was allowed, and she was called upon to pay court-fee on her moiety share in the property in dispute. But, instead of demanding court-fee separately on the value of her moiety share in the property in dispute, the office of the Court below demanded court-fee from her on the basis that the suit was treated as one for the entire property, and she was called upon to pay the difference between the court-fee payable on the entire value of the property minus the amount already paid by Tunni Lal.

(3.) The learned Stamp Reporter in this Court has reported, and, in our opinion, rightly, that this basis for realisation of court-fee in the Court below was wrong. He has relied upon the decision of the Taxing Judge in the case of Mushi Lachmi Narayan Lal V/s. Bhupendra Prasad Sukul A.I.R. 1948 Pat. 356. It should be noted in this case that the Court below had ordered that the lady would be deemed to have filed her suit on the date she was allowed by the Court below to be added as a co- plaintiff. Thus though the plaint is written on one paper, really there are two plaints on similar allegations, one by Tunni Lal in respect of his moiety share, and the other by the lady Mt. Annapurna Dai, in respect of her husband's moiety share. The two plaints in the eye of law, according to the directions of the Court below, would be deemed to have been filed on two different dates also. Hence, they are really two different subjects within the meaning of Section 17, Court-fees Act. It has been contended that the claim of the two plaintiffs, though distinct, is based on the same cause of action, and, as it has been held by this Court that the word "subject" is equivalent to "cause of action", Section 17, Court-fees Act should not be invoked in the present case. It is true that in the earlier decisions of this Court, for example, Nauratan Lal V/s. Wilford Joseph Stephenson A.I.R. 1922 Pat. 359, Nawab Waziri Begum V/s. Shashi Bhushan Rai A.I.R. 1924 Pat. 77, Mahant Ram Narain Gir V/s. Gauri Shankar Lal A.I.R. 1928 Pat. 274 and Mt. Siabati v. Sibsahai A.I.R. 1944 Pat. 387, it has been held that "subject" in Section 17, Court- fees Act, means "cause of action". But those cases cannot be taken as an authority for the proposition that the one is synonymous with the other. As a matter of fact, it has been held in a number of decisions of this Court and of other High Courts that the word "subject" in this section is not capable of precise definition--see in this connection Haru Bepari v Roy Kshitish Busan Roy Bahadur which has been followed by Rowland. J. sitting as the Taxing Judge in the case of Ramadhin Singh V/s. Baijanath Pd. Singh A.I.R. 1943 Pat. 355. In that case, his Lordship has made the following relevant observations: It will be enough for me to say that I entirely agree with the learned Calcutta Judges in the view that subject in Section 17 is not the same as cause of action that on the one band it is difficult to see how distinct causes of action can ever be one subject within the meaning of Section 17, while on the other hand it is possible for a suit based on one cause of action to embrace more than one subject within the meaning of the section, and it will be sufficient for the determination of this reference if I express my dear conviction that separate claims to relief are ordinarily to be considered as separate and distinct subjects. Hence, in some cases--it must depend on the facts and circumstances of each individual case--"subject" in Section 17, Court-fees Act, may be equivalent to "cause of action". But in other cases it may not be so. Distinct causes of action cannot form one subject. But the converse is not necessarily true.