Orders permitting intervention and setting aside a decree were quashed due to non-compliance with natural justice, as the original Plaintiff was not served before her death, questioning the intervenor's locus standi.

JUDGMENT :

VALMIKI MENEZES, J.

1. Registry to waive office objections and register the matter.

2. Heard learned Advocates for the parties.

3. Rule. Rule is made returnable forthwith; at the request of and with the consent of learned Advocates for the parties, the matter is finally heard and disposed of. Learned Advocate, Mr. Vivek Rodrigues waives service on behalf of the Petitioners, learned Advocate Ms. Fawia Menezes Mesquita waives service on behalf of Respondent No. 1 and learned Advocate Ms. Amira Razaq, waives service on behalf of Respondent No.2.

4. This petition challenges two orders passed by the Court of Civil Judge Junior Division ‘A’ Court at Vasco Da Gama in Civil Misc. Application No. 36/2018/B (filed under Order 9 Rule 13 CPC in Regular Civil Suit No. 83/2008/B). The first order under challenge is dated 12.02.2020, by which the Civil Court allowed an application at Exhibit D-9 filed by Respondent No. 1 herein, permitting him to intervene in the application (Civil Misc. Application No. 36/2018/B). The second order dated 01.04.2025, which has been impugned herein, by which an application at Exhibit D-37 dated 27.06.2024, filed by the Plaintiff, seeking recall of the first order dated 12.02.2020, on the ground that the intervention was permitted without having any notice being issued by the Court to the original Plaintiff.

5. The following facts would be of relevance to decide the present petition:

(a) Regular Civil Suit No. 83/2008/B was filed by the original Plaintiff Maria Pia Carvalho for declaration that the name of the Communidade of Cortalim (original sole Defendant) was wrongly recorded in the occupants column of the Survey Records in Form I & XIV of land under Survey Nos. 2, 3 and 4 of village Cortalim. Further relief was sought for a direction to delete the name of the Defendant in the Survey Records and substituting the same with name of the Plaintiff. After service on the Communidade of Cortalim it put in appearance, however, thereafter stopped appearing and the suit came to be decreed on 01.09.2010, granting the reliefs sought in the plaint.

(b) The Decree was acted upon by the original Plaintiff substituting the name of the Communidade of Cortalim in the occupants column of the Survey Records of the aforementioned suit properties.

(c) The original Defendant i.e. the Communidade of Cortalim by an application under Order 9 Rule 13 CPC which is dated 05.10.2018, presented on 08.10.2018, before the Civil Court, sought for setting aside of this Decree claiming that it had no knowledge of the Decree and attributed knowledge of the Decree through the service of a mutation notice received for the change in the name in the Revenue Records. This application came to be numbered as Exhibit 1/B by the Trial Court in the disposed suit. The application was filed by the then Attorney of the Communidade of Cortalim/Defendant, Respondent No.1(John Philip Pereira), who has supported the application by filing his affidavit.

(d) Since the cause title of this application had not mentioned that the Applicant was the Communidade of Cortalim, the Court issued notice to the Communidade of Cortalim, instead of issuing notice to the original Plaintiff. It is not in dispute and a matter of record, that the Plaintiff was never served with the notice of this application until she passed away on 06.04.2020.

(e) Whilst, the application for setting aside the Decree was pending, the aforementioned Attorney of the Communidade of Cortalim, John Pereira came to be suspended by the order of the Administrator of Communidades dated 30.04.2018, immediately prior to filing of the application for setting aside the Decree; this order came to be stayed ex-parte in an App