N.L.Untwalia, J.

1. This appeal by the defendant raises an interesting question of law. The plaintiff-respondent filed a suit for realisation of Rs. 500.00 as damages for defamation of the plaintiff by the defendant. The case of the plaintiff is that he is a respectable man and a man of substantial means and is held in esteem and regard by the public. He lived in a rented house belonging to the defendant who mostly resides at Sultanpur in U. P.

The plaintiffs son had purchased a house contiguous south of the defendants house and was constructing the same. The defendant filed Title Suit No. 366 of 1948 with regard to some disputes which crept up between the defendant and the plaintiffs son while the latter was constructing his house. The defendant sent a registered notice in Urdu from Sultanpur to the plaintiff at Siwan. The plaintiff, it was said, is not conversant with Urdu script and he, therefore, got the notice read over by one Kurban Ali in presence of several other persons. The notice contained defamatory and false allegations against him and he was very much Pained and surprised at them. The defamatory statement lowered the plaintiff in the estimation of the public a