JUDGMENT - CHAINANI, J. :

The father of appellants Nos. 1 and 2 and husband of appellant No. 3 had given on lease a land S. No. 128 of Mouje Kothrud in Haveli Taluka to the respondent-Company on 11th February 1944. One of the conditions of the lease was that the Company should not sub-lease or transfer the land to any other person without the permission of the lessors. The Company, however, assigned its leasehold rights to one of its Directors, G. N. Patwardhan, for a consideration of Rs. 8,200. The land is now in the possession of Patwardhan. The Company subsequently filed a suit for setting aside the assignment in favour of Patwardhan. This was dismissed. In 1953 an order was made for the winding up of the Company and an Official Liquidator was appointed. He obtained a decree for over Rs. 8,000 against Patwardhan. This decree has not yet been executed. The appellants were paid rent for three years by the Liquidator, but it is their case that they have not received rent due to them since 1953. It is also the contention of the appellants that the Company has committed several breaches of the conditions of the lease. According to them, a large number of trees standing on the land had been wrongfully cut down. They, therefore, gave notices to the Company and Patwardhan terminating the lease. They also asked for possession of the land being given to them. Thereafter, they made an application to the District Judge under S. 446 of the Companies Act, 1956, for leave to file a suit against the Company in order to obtain possession

of the land. The learned District Judge rejected the application. The appellants have, therefore, appealed.

(2) Mr. Khare, who appears for the Official Liquidator, has contended that the appeal is not competent. Section 483 of the Act provides that appeals from any order made, or decision given, in the matter of the winding up of a Company by the Court shall lie to the same Court to which, in the same manner in which, and subject to the same conditions under which, appeals lie from any order or decision of the Court in cases within its ordinary jurisdiction. Mr. Khare has urged that the order passed by the District Judge refusing to grant leave to the appellants to file a suit against the Company cannot be said to be an order made or decision given in the matter of winding up. We are unable to accept this argument. In our opinion, the words "in the matter of the winding up of a Company" are sufficiently wide to include an order of the kind appealed against. In Maneklal Mansukhbai v. Saras-pur Manufacturing Co. Ltd., 29 Bom LR 253: (AIR 1927 Bom 167) (A), an appeal was entertained against an order passed by the District Judge refusing to grant leave to the appellant to proceed with a suit.

The question whether an appeal lay against such an order was, however, not raised or decided in this case. A Full Bench of the Lahore High Court held in Sansar Chand v. Punjab Industrial Bank Ltd., ILR 10 Lah. 806: (AIR 1929 Lah 707) (B), on an interpretation of corresponding S. 202 of the old Companies Act, that "it is wide enough to cover appeals against any order made in the matter of winding up of a Company provided such an order finally decides a dispute between the parties or deprives the appellant of a substantial and important right and is not a mere formal or interlocutory order."

(3) This decision of the Lahore High Court has been referred to with approval in Bachharaj Factories Ltd. v. Hirjee Mills Ltd., 57 Bom LR 378: ((S) AIR 1955 Bom 355) (C), in which it was observed that S. 202 of the old Companies Act, which corresponds to S. 483 of the present Act, conferred a substantial and a very valuable right and that the Court must be anxious not in any way to cut down or impair that right. It was held that the first part of the section provided a right of appeal against an order or decision which was not purely procedural in character, but which affected the rights or liabilities of parties, that the second part of the

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