A notice under Section 77 of the Indian Railways Act is required to be served on the General Manager and not to any sectional or departmental Head.

( 1 ) THIS Rule has been issued at the instance of the Union of India representing the Eastern Railway and it is directed against a decree for a sum of Rs. 174-14-6 together with costs and interest passed by the Small Cause Court Judge, Asansol. The facts of the case which are not in dispute may be stated as follows : the plaintiffs opposite parties were consignees of two consignments of handkerchiefs from Ahamedabad to Barakar under Railway Receipts No. 45622 and 34623 bearing the same date viz. , 12-9-51. The consignments arrived at Barakar and when the plaintiffs went to take delivery, they were granted short delivery receipts of 29 dozens of handerchiefs in one consignment and 13 dozens in another consignment. The plaintiffs alleged that this shortage in both the consignments was due to gross and wilful neglect and misconduct on the part of the defendant Railway and that the consignments wore found to be "tampered with and contents taken away" while the consignments were in the charge and custody of the defendant. The plaintiffs accordingly claimed to recover a sum of Rs. 174-14-6 AS compensation for the price of the handkerchiefs which were not delivered to them. In the plaint the defendant was described as Union of India representing (1) The Eastern Railway, (2) The Western Railway and (3) The Northern Railway, because in the course of transit the consignments had to be carried over all these Railways. The suit was contested only by the Eastern Railway and in paragraph 7 of their written statement, they raised the plea that no legal, valid and sufficient notice either under Section 77 of the Indian Railways Act or under Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure had been served on the defendant and for the non-service of statutory notices, the suit was liable to be dismissed. It appears from the materials on the record that notice under Section 77 of the Railways Act was served only upon the Chief Commercial Manager of the Eastern Railway and no notice under the said section was served upon the other two Railways. The learned Small Cause Court Judge overruled the defence and decreed the plaintiffs' claim against all the defendants holding that it was enough for the plaintiffs to cause only one copy of the notice under Section 77 of the Indian Railways Act to be served on the Union of India as one entity instead of three such notices on Union of India representing the three Railways. Against that decree of the Small Cause Court Judge the defendant has obtained the present Rule. In the first place, it is to be observed that the learned Small Cause Court Judge was not right in holding that the three Railways constituted one entity under the law. The decision upon which he relied for this purpose, namely, the decision of this Court in the case of Dominion of India v. Jagadish Prosad Pannalal, AIR 1949 Cal 622 (A), does not really decide that point. In that case Harrie's C. J. pointed out that a particular result would follow if it, were held that the different Rail- ways in India were owned by the Government of India alone and quite a different result would follow if the Railway be treated as different entities. His Lordship did not actually decide that as a matter of law the different Railways had lost their independent existence as a result of the acquisition by the Central Government of all the different Railways of India. As a matter of fact, such a conclusion is impossible so long as Section 80 of the Indian Railways Act and Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure are on the Statute Book. Section 80 of the Indian Railways Act provides that a suit for compensation for loss, destruction or deterioration of goods may be brought either against the Railway Administration to which the goods were delivered by the consignor or against the Railway Administration on whose railway the loss, destruction or deterioration occurred Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure provides that"no suit shall be instituted against