Satish Chandra, J. - (1.) THE same point is involved in all the three appeals. F. A. F. O. No. 142 of 1966 has been filed by the plaintiff. It is directed against an order declaring the suit to have abated.
(2.) DIDWANIA and Co. (P) Ltd. tha petitioner-appellant, is a registered Company. It went in voluntary liquidation. The two liquidators, acting on behalf of this Company, filed the present suit. The plaint was eaded as Didwania and Co. (P) Ltd. (In li quidation) having its registered office at Mohalla Chitraghanta in the city of Varanasi through its Liquidators Gopal Lal Gupta and Ram Shanker Singh. During the pendency of the suit Gopal Lal Gupta, one of the liquidators, died on 22-11-1961. The Com pany by a resolution, appointed one Kedar Nath as the co-liquidator. It appears that the trial Court had permitted the plaintiff-company to sue in forma pauperis. Aggriev ed, the defendant had filed a revision in the High Court against that order. After the decision of dismissal of the revision, the record was received back by the trial court on 20-4-1965. Thereafter the proceedigs commenced and on 3rd November 1965, an application for amendment of the plaint was made on behalf of the plaintiff. It was pray ed that in the title of the suit the name of Gopal Lal Gupta be struck off and the words "deceased" be written thereafter and that the name of Kedar Nath be added. The court below has dismissed this application on the ground that the liquidators, for all practical purposes, were to be deemed to be the plaintiffs in the suit. An application for substitution of the heirs of the deceased li quidator ought to have been made within 90 days of the appointment of the succes sor. The successor was appointed on 24-1-1962. The suit abated when no application for substitution was made within the pres cribed period of limitation. We have had some difficulty in appreciating the line of reasoning that ap pealed to the learned Judge. The learned Judge observed that it is true that the plain tiff was Didwania and Co. (P) Ltd., a juristic personality. It was no man's case that the plaintiff had died. A suit cannot possibly abate when the parries to it are alive. The liquidator acted only as a vehicle upon whom service of summons etc., could be made, on behalf of the Company. The death of such a person cannot be equated with the death of a party to the suit. Since the plaintiff was alive, the suit could not be declared to have abated, by reason of the death of one of the persons through whom the plain tiff-Company had sued. An application for amendment of the title of the plaint was not an application for substitution of the heirs of a deceased party. Such an application was not governed by any law of limitation. The prayer in the application was a technical one, meant merely to keep the record of the suit straight.
(3.) IN the result all the three ap peals succeed and are allowed. The im pugned orders are set aside and the applications for amendment made by the successor liquidator are allowed. The ap pellant in these appeals will be entitled to costs from the contesting respondents. Appeals allowed.;