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2007 Supreme(Guj) 301

Gujarat High Court
Judgename :RAVI R.TRIPATHI
GREENGOLD TIMBER PRIVATE LIMITED - Appellant
Versus
SHIPRA OCEAN TRADE PVT.LTD. - Respondent
Spl. Civil Appln 24969 Of 2006
Decided On : 05/07/2007

Advocates Appeared: C.L.SONI, KETTY A.MEHTA

Headnote:Point in Issue :

       Whether order of trial Court suffer from any infirmity ? - No.

       Head Note :

       Civil Procedure Code, 1908 (Central Act 5 of 1908) - Order 37 - Rule 1 and 2 - Summary suit - Conditional leave to defend - Order passed by trial Court taking into consideration directions issued by High Court earlier and also the merits of case - Counsel of petitioner keeping High Court into dark about previous order of the High Court - Petition liable to be dismissed on this ground - However, on merit also, impugned order of trial Court found proper -Further, prayer of stay of order also rejected - Constitution of India, 1950 - Article 227 - Practice and Procedure.

       Held :

       On perusal of order under challenge dated 16.10.2006, this Court finds that the Judge has struck a balance between the parties and has divided the claim in two parts. For one part of the claim, he found that there is a triable issue, whereas the part of the claim in his option is such, for which no defence is available with the defendant. Therefore, the Judge has rightly protected the interest of the plaintiff by permitting, the defendant to defend the suit on his producing a Bank Guarantee of Rs. 60 lakhs before the Court [Para 12]

       The Judge has not committed any error, which warrants interference at the hands of this Court. Hence, this petition fails. In view of the observations made hereinabove, the petition is dismissed with cost of Rs. 7,500/-. [Para 13]

       This Court has found no substance in the matter and in view of the observations made by this Court about the conduct of the petitioner before this Court, this Court is of the opinion that it will be a miscarriage of justice if the petitioner is granted the stay and hence, the request is rejected. [Para 14]

       Conclusion :

       Conditional leave to defend by rightly granted.

       Cases Referred :

       M/s. Sunil Enterprises and Anr. vs. SBI Commercial and International Bank, AIR 1998 SC 2317;; Defiance Knitting Industries (P) Ltd. vs. Jay Arts, 2006 (8) SCC 25;; P.P. Prajapati vs. M.S, Jagdish Timber Mart & Ors., 1985 GLH (UJ) 2;; Santosh Kumar vs. Mool Singh, 1958 SCR 1211 = AIR 1958 SC 321 Milkiram (India) Private Ltd. vs. Chaman Lal Bros, AIR 1965 SC 1698;; Michael Eng. and Mfg. vs. basic Equipment Corporation, AIR 1977 SC 577.

       Decided in Favour of :

       Respondent

       Petition Dismissed with Cost

( 1 ) THE petitioner original defendant is before this Court being aggrieved by order dated 16-10-2006 passed by the learned Additional Senior Civil Judge, gandhidham below Exhibits 15 and 18 in special Civil Suit No. 19 of 2003. It is prayed that the said order be modified and the present petitioner defendant be permitted to defend the suit unconditionally and the condition of furnishing bank guarantee of Rs. 60 lakhs be quashed and set aside.

( 2 ) THE matter was argued by the learned senior counsel for the petitioner Mrs. Ketty a. Mehta, who did not point out that the order under challenge is passed after the matter was remanded by this Court. The learned advocate Mr. Soni for the respondent original plaintiff pointed out to this court that earlier the respondent herein had approached this Court by Special Civil Application No. 17851 of 2005 and by order dated 12-7-2006 (Coram : Hon ble Mr. Justice A. M. Kanadial, the matter was remanded. Learned Advocate Mr. Soni invited attention of the Court to the relevant observations made by this Court in order dated 12-7-2006. Operative part of the order reads as under :

"12. For the foregoing reasons, the petition is allowed with no order as to costs. The impugned order 26-7-2005 passed by the learned Additional Senior Civil Judge, gandhidham, Kachchh, below application ex. 18 is hereby quashed and set aside and the matter is remanded to the learned trial judge for deciding the application Ex. 15 summons for judgment filed by the plaintiff and the application Ex. 18 filed by the defendant seeking unconditional leave to defend the suit afresh, after giving ample opportunity to both the parties. "

( 3 ) THE property demands that the learned senior counsel for the petitioner ought to have invited attention of the Court to this important aspect of the matter. For the reasons best known to the learned senior counsel, she did not invite attention of the Court to this particular aspect of the matter.

( 4 ) LEARNED advocate for the respondent mr. Soni invited attention of the Court to the other observations made by this Court in its order dated 12-7-2006 in paragraphs 6, 7, 9 and 10, the same are reproduced hereunder for ready reference : "6. Mr. CL Soni, learned advocate of the plaintiff, submitted that the order granting unconditional leave to defend the suit is an unreasoned order. He also submitted that though the plaintiff has produced High Sea sales bills issued by the plaintiff to the defendant and High sea Purchase Letters addressed by the defendant to the Assistant commissioner of Customs, Custom House, kandla, declaring that it has purchased the goods in the consignments from the plaintiff, the learned trial Judge has considered only the books of accounts and jumped to the conclusion that since the entries in the ledger produced by the plaintiff have no evidentiary value, there is a triable issue between the parties and, therefore, the defendant is entitled to unconditional leave to defend the suit. Mr. Soni, learned advocate of the plaintiff has also asserted that the defendant has made total denial about the purchase of goods by it from the plaintiff though it has confirmed the purchase of goods from the plaintiff in the letters written to the assistant Commissioner of Customs. Therefore, according to Mr. Soni, learned advocate of the plaintiff, the learned trial Judge has failed to exercise the jurisdiction vested in him and, therefore, it has resulted in miscarriage of justice and since the learned trial Judge has committed jurisdictional error, this Court can correct it in exercise of the powers conferred under article 227 of the Constitution. He, therefore, urged to allow the petition by quashing and setting aside the impugned order passed by the learned trial Judge.

7. Per contra, Mr. Nalin Thakkar, learned advocate of the defendant, has supported the order passed by the learned trial Judge granting unconditional leave to defend the suit. Mr. Thakkar has submitted that the d

































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