JUDGMENT

Lort-Williams, J. - In this suit the plaintiffs alleged that on 30th April 1940, the Registrar of the Tribunal of Arbitration of the Bengal Chamber of Commerce informed them that the defendants had applied for arbitration, in accordance with the provisions of an alleged contract, regarding a claim for damages for failure to deliver a thousand maunds of jute under Messrs. Bri. dhichand Mulchand's contract No. 48 dated 9th November 1939. Thereupon, they inspected the contract or bought note which had been passed by the broker and dated 9th November 1939 and found that it had been materially altered without their consent, and this had been done fraudulently, and the contract was rendered void by such material alteration. The contract was for the purchase by the defendants from the plaintiffs of jute for delivery to the Presidency Jute Mills, "shipment or rail despatch November 1939." The defendants had inserted the word "December" after the figures "1939." The contract or bought note contained an arbitration clause. The plaintiffs argued that the alteration vitiated the document altogether, and there being no contract there could be no submission to arbitration.

2. The defendan