LALA JAGESHWAR PRASAD Vs. SHYAM BEHARI LAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a landlord's second appeal from the concurrent decisions of the courts below dismissing his suit for the recovery of rent from the defendant respondent. It raises an important question of law concerning the application of the principle of res judicata to the findings of a Court of Small Causes. The appellant Jageshwar Prasad filed this suit against Shyam Behari Lal for the recovery of Rs. 1440 as arrears of rent on the basis of an agreement of tenancy. The defendant resisted the suit and denied that there was any contract of tenancy between him and the plaintiff. He also raised a number of other pleas which it is not necessary to consider in this appeal. The plaintiff contended that the finding of the Small Cause Court, in his previous suit for the recovery of rent from the defendant for an earlier period, that there was an agreement of tenancy between, the parties, operated as res judicata in the present suit and the defendant could not be permitted to deny the tenancy. THIS plea was overruled by the Additional Munsif, Kanpur who decided this question on merits, and held that the plaintiff had not proved the agreement of tenancy between him and the defendant. He dismissed the suit. The lower appellate court confirmed this decision and the plaintiff has come to this Court in second appeal.

(2.) LEARNED counsel for the plaintiff-appellant has argued that the view of the courts below that the finding of the Small Cause Court in the previous suit that there was a contract of tenancy between the parties does not operate as res judicata in the present suit is erroneous. On the other hand, it has been argued on behalf of the respondent by Mr. K. C. Saxena that Section 11 C. P. C. will apply only under certain conditions specified in the Section, and as these are not present in this case the earlier decision cannot operate as res judicata.

(3.) BUT this condition of competency to try the subsequent suit is imposed by Section 11 C. P. C. and not by the general principle of res judicata. This principle is wider in its scope than Section 11 which applies to "suits" only. The general principle, like Section 11 C. P. C., requires that the Court whose decision is to operate as res judicata in a subsequent suit should be competent to hear its own suit, but unlike Section 11, it does not require that it should be competent to hear the subsequent suit as well. However, the restrictive condition, imposed by Section 11, of the two-fold competency of the Court whose decision is to be operated as res judicata does not apply to Courts with exclusive jurisdiction. If the previous decision, was delivered by a Court which has exclusive jurisdiction to hear the matter before it that is, if no other Court could have heard that matter, its verdict will operate as res judicata in any subsequent proceedings even if it was not competent to hear the subsequent suit. The reason for this exception is that the exclusive jurisdiction conferred on the Court by law will cease to be exclusive if a matter decided by it is permitted to be re-heard by another Court. Therefore, the decisions of the revenue court, the Land Acquisition Court, or any other court, in a matter which it has the exclusive jurisdiction to hear and decide will bar a subsequent hearing of the same matter by a Civil Court.