JUDGMENT

SARYASACHI MUKHARJI, J. :—M/s. M. G. Brothers Lorry Service, the appellant is a firm, which carried on at the relevant time transport business and on the 1st of May, 1969 under a Way Bill, the plaintiff firm, M/s. Prasad Textiles, the respondent herein had consigned one bale of yarn worth about Rs. 5,000/- from their head office at Guntur to Vijayawada, at which place there was a branch office consigned "to self". The Way Bill and the invoice were in the usual course delivered to the State Bank of India with the instructions to deliver the same to the plaintiff-respondent M/s. Prasad Textiles at Vijayawada. It appears that the defendant-appellant M/s. M. G. Brothers Lorry Service failed to deliver the said goods to the respondent-plaintiff at Vijayawada. The appellants case was that the said, goods had actually arrived at Vijayawada on the very next day the same were, however, not taken delivery of at Vijayawada for some time and that between 16th and 20th of May, 1969 there was a cyclone at Vijaywada as a result of which the said goods were damaged in their godown and when the said goods were opened on 20th May, 1969 in the presence of the representative of the appellant