- (1.) ON 13-1-1955, an application was made by the appellant under Rule 13 of Chap. 13 of the rules of Court for the translation and printing of such parts of the record of the trial court as were considered necessary at the hearing of the appeal. The application was made on, the prescribed form, and in accordance with the provisions of Rule 14 was presented to the Deputy registrar, The application was unstamped, and the appellant contended that no court-fee was payable thereon. The practice in Allahabad has been to require such applications to bear a court-fee stamp of Rs. 3-12-0, but a different practice prevails in Lucknow where such applications are not stamped, and that practice has been approved in the recent case of -- 'baij nath Das v. Ram Charan Das', AIR 1954 All 812 (A ). As the question is one of great practical importance it has been referred to a Full Bench for further consideration.
(2.) IN 'baij Nath Das's case (A)' the view taken was that applications for translation and printing are not applications for the exercise of the judicial functions of the officer of the Court to whom they are presented, and that they did not therefore require to be stamped. With great respect we do not think that is a wholly correct approach to the problem for a court-fee is payable on many applications or petitions in which the prayer is for the exercise of purely administrative functions, as for example in the case of an application to a District Magistrate for permission to have a display of fireworks or for a police escort (see item 1 (b) of Schedule II, Court-fees Act ).
(3.) IN our opinion the answer to the question whether a court-fee is payable on applications for translation and printing will depend upon whether such applications come within the ambit of section 4, Court-fees Act, 1870, which so far as is material reads as follows: "4. No document of any of the kinds specified in the first or second schedule to this Act annexed, as chargeable with fees, shall be filed, exhibited or recorded in, or shall be received. . . . . by any of the said High Courts in any case coming before such Court. . . . . in the exercise of its jurisdiction as regards appeals from the Courts subject to its superintendence. . . . unless in respect of such document there be paid a fee of an amount not less than that indicated by either of the said schedules as the proper fee for such document. " Item 1 (e) of Schedule II of the Act is as follows: 1. Application or (e) When presented to a High Court: petition. (1) Under the Indian Companies Act, 1913, (Act 7 Sixty-two rupees, of 1913), for winding up a Company. (2) Under S. 115, Civil P. C. , 1908 (Act 5 of 1908), Five rupees. for revision of an order. (3) In any other case. Three rupees, twe;