DAVE, J. - (1.) JUDGE, Jodhpur, dated the 12th October, 1957.
(2.) THE facts giving rise to it are that three firms, namely, Peerdan Premchand of Bikaner, Randal Bhimraj of Jodhpur and Multanmal Nathmal of Jodhpur filed 3 separate applications in the court of the learned District Judge, Jodhpur, under the Provincial Insolvency Act (No. 5 of 1920) (which will hereinafter be referred as the Act) in order to get the appellants adjudged as insolvents. THE court registered 3 separate cases Nos. 22, 23 and 24 of 1957 on the basis of the said applications. It appears from the record that the appellants submitted an application in case No. 22 to the effect that they had come to know that an insolvency petition had been filed against them, that a prayer for the appointment of an interim receiver was made, that they had not committed any act of insolvency, that the application against them was filed mala fide in order to put them to loss and therefore no order against them should be passed without giving them an opportunity of hearing. On 12. 10. 57,the court heard both the parties and ordered that all the 3 applications should be consolidated. THE appellants were directed that they should produce their books of account in the court within 10 days and that they should also furnish the lists of their creditors and debtors and an inventory of their property, according to sec. 22 of the Act. It is against this order that the present appeal has been filed. The first objection raised by learned counsel for the appellants is that the learned District Judge has committed an error in ordering consolidation of the three applications. It is contended that the order for consolidation of the applications under sec. 15 of the Act could be made only after the appellants were adjusted insolvents under sec. 27. In support of his contention, learned counsel has referred to Dayaram Menghraj Vs. Shrimati Saktubai (1 ). In that case it was observed as follows - "there is nothing in sec. 15 of the Act empowering the Court to pass an order of consolidation of a petition for insolvency before it is admitted and before an opportunity has been afforded to the other parties" concerned of showing that the petition is not competent. Prima facie that section refers to consolidation of insolvency petitions after they are admitted and presupposes that such petitions are otherwise competent. Where the competency of the petitions is being challenged, it must be inquired into before an order of consolidation can be passed. If therefore the learned District Judge was of the opinion that there were grounds for consolidating this petition with the petition filed on 13th January, he should have directed the learned Sub-Judge to consider it if it was fit to be admitted and if it was admitted to give an opportunity to the other parties concerned of showing cause against its being granted If the petition was granted, that is to say, an order of adjudication was passed on it, then the two petitions could well have been consolidated. " I have given my earnest consideration to the above observation but with great respect I find it difficult to wholly concur with it. Sec. 15 of the Act runs as follows - "where two or more insolvency petitions are presented against the same debtor, or where separate petitions are presented against joint debtors, the Court may consolidate the proceedings or any of them, on such terms as the Court thinks fit. " It would appear from a plain reading of the section that it permits the Court to consolidate the -insolvency petitions after their presentation and it does no; provide that such insolvency petitions may be consolidated only after an order of adjudication under sec. 27 of the Act is made It may be further pointed out that sec. 18 which lays down the procedure for admission of the petitions appears after sec. 15 in sequence. Sec. 18 provides that the procedure laid down in the Code of Civil Procedure, with respect to the admission of plaints, shall so far as it is applicable, be followed in the case of insolvency petitions. Now, in the Code of Civil Procedure I have not been referred to any provision whereby it is required that a notice should go to the defendant before a plaint is admitted. I think that if it is held that the insolvency petitions may be consolidated only after the order of adjudication is made, then this procedure will entail multiplicity of proceedings and harassment to both the parties in several cases. For instance, I may refer to the facts of the present case itself. Here all the three applications have been filed by the creditors against the appellants and the allegations made against them are almost the same. All the three respondents have alleged that the appellants have committed acts of insolvency by making fraudulent transfers of a substantial part of their property and that their acts are covered by clauses (a), (b) and (c) of sec. 6 of the Act. Now, if all the three applications are not consolidated, then the evidence in all the three separate cases will almost be the same and it will undoubtedly end in the multiplicity of proceedings and harassment to both the parties. I do not, therefore, agree with the view expressed in the above case (1) that consolidation may be made only after the order of adjudication is made. It appears that the main consideration which led the learned Judges to hold the view, referred above, was that the opposite party should have an opportunity to be heard on the question whether the creditor is competent to file the application. In my opinion, there should be no impediment in the way of the appellants being heard on that point even after the three applications are consolidated. It would certainly be open to the appellants to point out to the learned District Judge when the case comes before him after consolidation that each one of the applications or all of them are fit to be dismissed either because the creditors were not competent to present them or for any other reason valid in law. There is thus little force in the first objection raised by learned counsel for the appellants and it is fit to be dismissed. Another contention put forward by learned counsel is that the court below had no authority to direct the appellants to produce their books of account at this stage of the case. It is not disputed that the lower court had the authority to direct the appellants to give an inventory of their property or lists of their creditors and debtors under sec. 22 of the Act. The main objection is that the first part of sec. 22 was not attracted, since all the applications were presented by the creditors and not by the debtors. In support of his contention, learned counsel has referred to Akloy Chand Begwani Vs. Emperor (2 ). In that case, one Akhoy Chand Begwani and his partners were adjudged insolvents and they were ordered by the learned Judge to file their books of account of their business. On their failure to comply with that order, they were prosecuted under sec. 69. One of the charges against them was that they had wilfully failed to perform the duties imposed upon them by sec. 22 of the Act. It was in that connect on that the learned Judges proceeded to observe that the section was badly worded and that the first part of the section related to one particular stage, namely, "on the making of an order admitting the petition" and the second part to all subsequent stages as the words "at any time thereafter" plainly indicated. It was further observed that "the Legislature could never have intended to make the first part of the section applicable to a case when an order has been made on a creditor's petition. To put such an interpretation would be to make the provision unworkable, for a debtor would hardly have knowledge of his creditor's petition being admitted until he is served with notice of the order admitting it and yet his duty would arise on such order being made. " I respectfully agree with this observation, but it may be pointed out that the learned Judges did not go so far as to say that after admitting the petition, the court has no power to direct the alleged insolvent to produce his books of account. In fact it was observed by the learned Judges themselves that the second part of the section applied to both classes of cases i. e. , both to the debtor's and the creditor's application for insolvency and "to all stages of the proceedings that follow the order admitting the petition. " Now in the present case, all the three petitions were admitted by the learned District Judge and therefore it cannot be said that he had no authority to direct the appellants to produce their books of account. It is, however, contended by learned counsel for the appellants that his clients want to contest the right of the respondents to present the applications against them and they further wanted to contest strenuously that they had not committed any act of insolvency. It is prayed that so long as these objections of the appellants were not decided by the learned District Judge, they should not have been compelled to produce their books of account, because it would put a stop to their normal business. I think there is force in this contention about the propriety of the order of the learned District Judge. It does appear from the record that the appellants had taken an objection to the effect that the respondents had no right to present the applications and that the allegation about the act of insolvency on the part of the appellants was incorrect. In the face of such a contention having been raised by the appellants, it was but proper that the learned District Judge should have first given his decision on it before directing the appellants to submit their books of account in the court It would therefore be proper to set aside this part of the order of the learned Judge at this stage. The appeal is, therefore, partly allowed and the order of the learned District Judge directing the appellants to produce their books of account is set aside, since no reasons have been given why the production of the account books is necessary at this stage. It may, however, be clarified that if while deciding the matter under sec. 27 of the Act the learned Judge thinks it necessary to examine the appellants' books of account, he will be tree to make such a direction giving his reasons for the same. The parties are left to bear their own costs in this Court. .;