An admission made in the written statement cannot be withdrawn by way of an amendment.

SHEKHAR B. SARAF, J.

1. The present matter relates to an application for amendment of the written statement filed by the defendants. The factual matrix of the case is as follows:

a. The plaintiffs have filed this suit in the month of August, 2016 seeking a decree for various sums of money on account of payment of royalty and compensation.

b. The brief facts in the plaint are that one Dr. Durlav Chandra Dutta, since deceased, was the original owner of the copyright of certain literary works as also various artistic works. Upon his demise, his daughter being the plaintiff no. 1 became the sole owner of the copyright and was, therefore, solely entitled to receive all royalty thereon. The plaintiff no. 2, the husband of plaintiff no. 1 being a well known doctor had edited the literary works and made valuable contributions to several editions of the text books for a number of years. Owing to differences between the plaintiffs and the defendants, the agreement between them allowing the defendants to publish the literary works were terminated and thereafter the suit was filed for recovery of outstanding royalty and compensation.

c. The defendants entered appearance and filed the written statement in the month of March, 2017. Thereafter, the defendants moved an application being G.A. No. 3881 of 2017 for deleting the name of the plaintiff no. 2 from the array of parties. This Court after hearing both the parties, by order dated 19th September, 2018 was pleased to dismiss the said application. Thereafter, being aggrieved and dissatisfied with the order dated 19th September, 2018 the defendants preferred an appeal before the Division Bench of the High Court, and after hearing both the parties, by an order dated 19th December, 2018, the Division Bench dismissed the appeal. The operative portion of the order dated 19th December, 2018 is delineated below:

“There appear to be two sets of cause of action pursued in the plaint; one, by the daughter as the heir of the author for outstanding royalty in respect of the book and the other by way of damages for the perceived wrongful conduct of the appellants herein. It is possible that neither cause of action may result in any relief being granted or one of them being declined; but the prayer for deletion of the second plaintiff amounts to a prayer for the dismissal of the suit on merits qua the second plaintiff, which is impermissible ahead of the trial unless the plaint altogether discloses no cause of action. Even in a scenario where the plaint may not disclose any right of some of the plaintiffs, the Court may not entertain a defendant's application for deletion of the names of such plaintiffs; but at the time of the grant of relief, the Court may confine the reliefs to some of the plaintiffs and exclude the reliefs to the other plaintiffs.

For the reasons aforesaid, the other impugned dated September 19, 2018 does not call for any interference as no prejudice has been suffered by the appellants thereby. The appellants are left free to canvass whatever grounds they may be entitled to on the merits of the claim or of the individual plaintiffs at the trial.

APO No. 381 of 2018 is dismissed. GA No. 3326 of 2018 and GA No. 3382 of 2018 are disposed of.

There will be no order as to costs.”

d. The present application by way of a master summons was affirmed on 17th January, 2019. This Court had directed exchange of affidavits and the parties have filed their respective affidavit in opposition and reply.

2. Mr. Siddhartha Banerjee, Advocate appearing on behalf of the defendants submitted that the amendments in the written statement are for correction of certain bonafide mistakes as certain material facts had not been included in the original written statement and such material facts were relevant and necessary to prove the defendants' case. He further submitted that due to some typographical mistakes, some errors were present in the written statement that required correction. He further submitted that