NARAYANGUNJ CENTRAL CO-OPERATIVE SALE AND SUPPLY SOCIETY LTD Vs. MAFIZUDDIN AHMED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The two revision cases in connexion with which this reference has been made have arisen out of a suit, the facts of which, so far as they are necessary at the present stage, are the following: On the .10 January 1930, the Narayangunj Central Co-operative Sale and Supply Society Ltd., obtained an arbitration award under the provisions of Act 2 of 1912 against two persons, Moulvi Mafizuddin Ahmed and Jowad Ali Khondkar. The award was for an amount of Rs. 11,400. The company went into liquidation, and thereafter the award was put into execution. After failing in certain objections that were taken to the execution of the award, the former of the said defendants brought a suit in the Munsif's Court at Narayangunj to set aside the award on a declaration that it had been fraudulently obtained and also praying for a permanent injnuction to restrain the liquidator from proceeding with the execution. He valued the suit at Rs. 49 and paid court-fees on the plaint according to such valuation. The Munsif held that as the plaintiff wanted to get rid of a document creating a liability for Rs. 11,400 the suit was prima facie undervalued, that the court-fee paid was insufficient, and that his Court had no jurisdiction to entertain the suit. He accordingly returned the plaint to the plaintiff for presentation to the proper Court and dismissed the prayer for a temporary injunction which the plaintiff had also made. On appeals being preferred by the plaintiff from the said orders of the Munsif, the Subordinate Judge held that as the case fell within Section 7 (iv), Cls. (c) and (d), Court-fees Act (7 of 1870), the plaintiff was entitled to put his own valuation on the suit and the Court had no jurisdiction to revise such valuation. He held also that in the circumstances of the case the plaintiff was entitled to the temporary injunction he had prayed for. He accordingly made the following order: It is therefore ordered that the appeals be allowed. The plaint shall be returned to the appellant for filing the same in the lower Court where it will be registered as a suit, and trial thereon shall proceed, and it is ordered that the respondent defendants be forbidden from executing the decree till the disposal of the suit, which must be expedited by the plaintiff.

(2.) Against this order, which really consists of two orders, two applications in revision have been made to this Court. The validity of the orders complained of in these applications depends on two questions which have been formulated in the order of reference in these words: (1) Whether in suits to obtain a declaratory decree or order where consequential relief is prayed for and in suits to obtain an injunction, where the Court finds the relief claimed as undervalued, it is entitled under Order 7, Rule 11(b), Civil P. C, to require the plaintiff to correct the valuation stated by him in accordance with the provisions of Section 7, Court-fees Act. (2). Whether the case of Mt. Umatul Batul V/s. Nanji Koer (1907) 6 C L J 427, was correctly decided? The conflict of judicial authority that exists on question (1) aforesaid has been pointed out in the order of reference, and in it some of the more important decisions bearing upon the question have been noticed. One of these decisions in which the matter was elaborately discussed is the case of Mt. Umatul Batul V/s. Mt. Nanji Koer (1907) 6 C L J 427. In that case Mukerjee, J., set out in detail the history of the change made in 1891 in Section 7 (iv), Court-fees Act (7 of 1870), by the Repealing and Amending Act, (11 of 1891), and on comparing the wordings of the section as it had stood when the Codes of 1859, 1877 and 1882 respectively were in force, and on an exhaustive review of the decisions then existing, adopted the view which had been previously taken by this Court in the case of Baidya Nath v. Makhan Lal (1890) 17 Cal 680 and observed thus: In oases falling under Section 7. sub-section (iv), Court-fees Act, although the plaintiff is to state the amount at which he values the relief sought the legislature never intended that the plaintiff should be at liberty to assign any arbitrary value and thus be free to choose the Court in which he should bring his suit. The learned Judges relied upon Secs.7, 8 and 11, Suits Valuation Act (7 of 1887), as clearly indicating that this could not have been the intention of the Legislature. In our opinion, the view is unquestionably well founded and, as has been shown above, it is supported by the history of the section.

(3.) In my opinion, the conclusions summarized in these observations are correct and they should be affirmed. I think, therefore, that it should be held that though Order 7, Rule 11 which in its clause (b) gives the Court power in a case of undervaluation of a relief to require the plaintiff to correct the valuation given by him in his plaint and to reject the plaint in case the plaintiff fails to do so, appears in a procedural code, while nothing as to such correction is stated in the taxing statute itself namely the Court-fees Act (7 of 1870), yet the two enactments have to be read together and simultaneously given effect to when there is nothing in neither enactment expressly indicating any contrary intention. In Section 7, sub-section (4), all that is said is that the amount of fee in suits falling within that sub-section shall be computed according to the amount at which the relief sought is valued in the plaint or memorandum of appeal. and also that in all such suits the plaintiff shall state the amount at which he values the relief sought.