N. M. MIABHOY, N. K. VAKIL, J.

( 1 ) THIS is an appeal filed by the original plaintiff against the decision of the Civil Judge (Senior Division) Baroda dismissing her Special Civil Suit No. 4 of 1957. The few material facts necessary for the decision of this appeal are as fol lows:-

( 2 ) THE appellant Bai Chanchal widow of Kabhai filed the aforesaid suit against deceased Ganpatram Jadavji for having the award obtained by the said Ganpatram under the Bombay Agricultural Debtors Relief Act 1947 in Consolidated Case No. 8051 of 1950 against her set aside on the ground that the said Ganpatram had obtained the said award by practising fraud on the Court inasmuch as he had perjured himself and had also made use of two forged documents as evidence to support his false case. She also prayed for the possession of the suit land. For the sake of convenience we shall refer to Bai Chanchal as the plaintiff and Ganpatram as defendant hereinafter in this judgment. The plaintiffs case was that her deceased husband had purchased the suit land for a consideration of Rs. 4751/from the defendant on the 18th March 1942 He was also put in possession of the suit land. Thereafter the Bombay Agricultural Debtors Relief Act was made applicable to the area where the land was situated the defendant filed an application in the Court established under that Act for adjudging the said transaction to be a mortgage The defendant alleged that the time for redemption was agreed to be nine years. On the date of hearing the plaintiff remained absent though she had appeared at earlier stages and it is alleged by her that taking undue advantage of her absence on that day the respondent produced two forged documents in evidence in Court made a false statement and obtained an order in his favour in the absence of the plaintiff. The said two documents purported to be of 1942. One of the documents purported to be a banakhat written on a four anna Stamp Paper of the year 1933 and the other a receipt on a one anna revenue stamp. The plaintiff has further alleged that she came to know about these forged documents on the 16th of July 1954 when she received the notice from the Court calling upon her to receive the money deposited by the defendant in Court. She then made an application to the Court to set aside the award passed in her absence and for restoring the case on file for heating. It appears that she also averred therein that the award was obtained on the basis of the two forged documents. The application was however dismissed. She appealed to the District Court against the said dismissal but the appeal also met with the same fate. After the appeal was dismissed she filed the aforesaid civil suit in the Court of the Civil Judge (Senior Division) at Baroda.

( 3 ) THE defendant denied the allegation of fraud and the use of forged documents. He also raised other defences and contended inter alia that the Court had no jurisdiction to entertain the suit as the Civil Courts jurisdiction was barred under section 51a of the Bombay Agricultural Debtors Relief Act. The trial Court raised several issues but tried issue No. 1 as a preliminary issue which was as follows:- whether the present suit is not maintainable in view of the provisions of section 51a of the B. A. D. R. Act ? the learned Judge held that the suit was not maintainable and dismissed it. He came to the conclusion that section 51a created an absolute bar against entertaining any suit by the Civil Court challenging the validity of any procedure or legality of any award or order once it is passed under the Bombay Agricultural Debtors Relief Act 1947 He further held that the ex parte award could be challenged even on the ground of fraud only under the provisions of the said Act and section 36 of the Act provided such a remedy. The plaintiff had resorted to that provision by filing an application to set aside the award wherein she had also raised the ground fraud but the Court rejected the plea and dismissed the appli

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