ORDER :

IA No.6467/2022(u/O.VII R.10 r/w O. VII R. 10A of CPC) in CS(COMM) 618/2021 and IA No.6504/2022(u/O.VII R.10 r/w O.VII R. 10A of CPC) in CS(COMM) 619/2021

1. The present suits are Commercial Suits that have been filed seeking recovery of amounts along with the interest.

2. Upon summons being issued to the defendant, the defendant filed the written statement on 29th March, 2022, wherein the preliminary objection was taken with regard to territorial jurisdiction of this Court.

3. In view of the aforesaid objection, the plaintiffs seek the return of the plaints in the present suits, with liberty to present the same before the Court of competent jurisdiction. Further, a refund of Court fees has been sought. As regards the refund of the Court fees, reliance has been placed on the judgment of this Court in Chief Controlling Revenue Authority & Anr. Vs. Fertilizer Corporation of India Ltd. & Ors., 1966 SCC OnLine Del 1, to submit that when a party seeks return of a plaint in order to file it before a Court of competent jurisdiction, the party cannot be compelled to pay Court fees twice over. Relevant observations made by this Court in the aforesaid judgment are reproduced below:-

6.“Shri Chadha has very eloquently argued that every State is entitled to realise revenue on court-fee and, therefore, merely because a citizen happens to pay court-fee in Punjab, he should not be held entitled to come to Delhi and seek justice without paying court-fee to the State of Delhi. This argument has not impressed me at all. Unless there is a specific bar in the Court-Fees Act or any statutory rules lawfully framed against the use of court-fee stamps purchased by a citizen in one State from being used in another State in the Union of India, I do not find any legal justification for depriving a citizen from using those stamps in a State other than that of the purchase. The various States in this Union are not foreign countries and my attention has not been drawn to any provision of law by the learned counsel for the petitioner which would show that court-fee purchased in one State can be valid in law only in that State and cannot be used in a different State. Justice, it must not be forgotten, is not sold by the State in this Republic. Payment of price of the court-fee into the coffers of the particular State, the Courts of which are lawfully approached by a citizen seeking justice, is not a constitutional condition precedent as has been sought to be suggested by a reference to entry No. 3 in List II of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution. To insist on a citizen paying court-fee twice over for seeking justice in the same cause, can be justified only on a clear and specific provision of law validly made. None has been cited in the present case except the rules mentioned above. The correctness of the decisions holding those rules to be outside the rule-making power, has not been questioned and I have not been persuaded in this case to disagree with the view taken in those decisions”.

4. Reliance is placed on the order dated 25th October, 2019 passed by the Supreme Court in Dr.(Col.) Subhash Chandra Talwar Vs. T. Choithram and Sons & Ors., to contend that, when rejection order is passed under Order VII Rule 10 of the CPC, it is not an order on merit of the suit and therefore, the plaintiffs are entitled to the refund of Court fees so that they can pay the Court fees in the State, where the suit would be filed afresh. Relevant observations of the Supreme Court in T. Choithram and Sons and Ors (supra) are set out below:-

“Thereafter, the petitioner filed an application for refund of court fees. This application has been rejected only on the ground that the appeal has been disposed of on merits. We are unable to agree with the High court. What has been disposed of is only the rejection order under Order VII Rule 10 of the code of Civil Procedure. This is no order on the merits of the suit. The effect is that the plaint has been ordered to be returne