- (1.) The petitioners have approached this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India aggrieved by the order dated 21-11-2005 passed by respondent No.1, Debts Recovery Appellate Tribunal whereby setting aside the order of the Debts Recovery Tribunal Allahabad (hereinafter referred to as 'DRT, Allahabad') , it has remanded the matter transferring it to Debts Recovery Tribunal, Lucknow (hereinafter referred to as 'DRT, Lucknow') for disposal afresh.
(2.) In brief the facts giving rise to this case are that the respondent No.2. Bank of Baroda (hereinafter referred to as the 'Bank') filed an application under Section 19 of the Recovery of Debts Due to Banks and Financial Institution Act, 1993 (hereinafter referred to as the 'Act' in short) against the petitioners for recovery of Rs. 35,91,746.17 along with cost and interest pendente lite and future. The aforesaid application was filed before DRT Allahabad and registered as TA 5/02. The petitioner opposing the aforesaid application, filed a written statement raising set off/counter claim of Rs. 1,06,34,614. During the pendency of the matter before DRT, Allahabad, a notification dated 31-1-2002 was issued under Section 3 of the Act establishing and constituting a Debts Recovery Tribunal at Lucknow and as a consequence thereof, the area of jurisdiction of DRT, Allahabad and DRT, Lucknow was also notified. Since, there is no provisions under the Act for suo motu transfer of cases pending before one DRT to another DRT on creation of new DRT with jurisdiction carved out from existing DRT and, therefore, TA 5/02 which was pending at DRT, Allahabad continued to proceed thereat and was not transferred to DRT, Lucknow. However, apprehending that the authorities on their own may transmit the record of the aforesaid case to Lucknow the petitioners preferred a writ petition No. 21861 of 2002 before this Court seeking a direction for not transferring his case to DRT, Lucknow and the order passed by a Division Bench of this Court on 22-5-2002is reproduced as under : "List this case in the first week of July, 2002 along with writ petition No. 20798 of 2002. Till then transfer of T. A. No. 5 of 2002 filed under Section 19 of the Recovery of Debts Due to the Bank and Financial Institutions Act, 1993 pending before the respondent No. 1 shall remain stayed. However, this order shall not be construed as stay or proceedings pending before the Debt Recovery Tribunal."
(3.) Consequently, DRT Allahabad proceeded with the matter and after framing eight issues, decided the matter by order dated 13-6-2003. Besides other things, DRT, Allahabad found that the Bank has included certain amounts, which were not advanced to the petitioners at all and, therefore, were not recoverable, its accounting was not reliable and correct and the rate of Interest was also wrongly charged and ultimately rejected the application of the Bank. Aggrieved by the order of DRT Allahabad, the Bank preferred appeal before Debts Recovery Appellate Tribunal (hereinafter referred to as 'DRAT, Allahabad') which has been decided by the order impugned in this Writ petition.;