G.C. Mital, J. - (1.) AFTER hearing the learned Counsel for the parties the order of the trial Court dated 7 -1 -1986 cannot be sustained. Defendant No. 1 was proceeded ex parte. He filed an application for setting aside the ex parte proceedings but that application was got dismissed as withdrawn. Then Defendant No. 1 filed an application for permission to join the proceedings from the stage they were going on, i.e., to cross -examine the witnesses who were to be produced after he had appeared on the scene. The court below by order dated 7 -1 -1986 declined the permission. It is his revision against the aforesaid order.
(2.) WAY back, in Sangram Singh v. Election Tribunal : A. I. R. 1955 S. C. 425, it was held that even if the ex parte proceedings are taken against a party, he is free to join at any stage of the proceedings without retracing the earlier proceedings unless he is allowed to do so by order of the Court. This very rule was retreated in Arjan Singh v. Mohindra Kumar : A. I. R. 1964 S. C. 993. Accordingly, Court below was clearly in error in stopping Defendant No. 1 from cross -examining the witnesses. For the reasons recorded above, this revision is allowed, the order of the Court below dated 7 -1 -1986 is set aside with a direction that Defendant No. 1 would be afforded opportunity to cross -examine the witnesses. The parties, through their counsel, are directed to appear before the trial Court on 24 -4 -1986, which is the date already fixed in the case.;