- (1.) THIS a plaintiff's second appeal in a suit for refund against the defendant State, which has been dismissed by the Court below on the ground that it is barred under article 62 of the Limitation Act. It has been placed before this Bench, having been referred by one of us, sitting singly, as the question of limitation involved in this appeal was considered by the learned single Judge to be not free from serious difficulties.
(2.) THE material facts leading up to this reference lie in a narrow compass. The plaintiff was a firm dealing in cloth at Bundi. The Customs Department of the defendant State recovered from the plaintiff on certain cloth imported by It during the period extending from the 19th August, 1949 to the 29th August, 1949, a sum of Rs. 894/9/9 as sales-tax in addition to the prescribed duty. The plaintiff's case was that the State had no authority to recover any money by way of sales-tax. Consequently the plaintiff after giving the necessary notice under Section 80 Civil procedure Code instituted the present suit for the recovery of a sum of Rs. 894/9/9 as principal and Rs. 29/2/- as interest plus a sum of Rs. I/ii/-as notice charges, in all amounting to Rs. 925/6/9. This suit was instituted in the Court of the Munsiff Bundi on the 19th July, 1954, that is, after a period of almost five years from the date of the recovery of the sales-tax. The principal defence and that is the only one on which the State relies at this stage is that the suit was barred by limitation, being governed by Article 62 of the Limitation Act which provides a period of three years from the date of the recovery of the money. The trial Court decreed the suit save for interest on the finding that although the suit was governed by three years' period of limitation, limitation was saved by certain acknowledgments held to have been made by the defendant State to the plaintiff with respect to the claim in question. On appeal by the State, the learned Senior Civil Judge disagreed with the view of the trial Court on the last-mentioned question and consequently the plaintiff's suit was thrown out as barred by time. It was argued before the learned Judge on behalf of the plaintiff that the suit was governed by Article 120 of the Limitation act; but this plea was repelled. Thereafter the plaintiff filed a second appeal to this court out of which the present reference has arisen. It was conceded before the learned single Judge that the plaintiff did not rely on the various acknowledgments for purposes of limitation and there the matter must rest so far as this aspect of the case is concerned. It was strongly contended, however, before the learned single Judge as it has been before us that the suit is properly governed by Article 120 of the Limitation Act and not Article 62. That is the only question for decision before us, and to this we propose to address ourselves at once.
(3.) ARTICLE 62 reads as follows :description of Period Time from suit oflimitation which period, begins to run for money Three When the payable by the years; money is defendant to received the plaintiff for money received by defendant for the plaintiff's use. The words in this Article which require to be interpreted are these, namely, "for money received by the defendant for the plaintiff's use". We have been referred to a large number of cases by learned Counsel on either side in support of their respective submissions. To undertake an examination of all these cases individually does not appear to us to be a profitable task and we, therefore, do not propose to attempt it.;