The main legal point established is that an amendment to the plaint should not alter the character of the suit and the court has jurisdiction to entertain the amended plaint.

1. The plaintiff is the revision petitioner and the revision petition is directed against the order of the court below refusing his application for amending the plaint. The suit is instituted by the plaintiff for recovery of Rs. 3893.09 being the balance and interest thereon due from the defendant on account of pattu-varavu transactions. In the application for amending the plaint the plaintiff stated that the balance due from the defendant is Rs. 4721.55 and the sum of Rs. 3065.54 mentioned in the plaint as the balance due is a mistake and that he should be allowed to amend the plaint so as to claim the sum of Rs. 4721-55 and interest thereon at the rate of 12% per annum from 19-1-1966.

2. The application for amendment was dismissed by the court below as it took the view that it does not satisfy the requirements of law, the amendment if allowed will change the character of the suit and the court has no jurisdiction to deal with the application, as the result of allowing the amendment will be to deprive the court of its jurisdiction to try the suit.

3. The first ground is based upon the decision in Kesavan v. Bharathan 1954 KLT. 513 where it was observed that:

"an application for amendment of pleading must state precisely the specific words, clauses or sentences to be added if the prayer is for addition and the precise place in the original pleading where these are to be inserted; if the amendment sought is for deletion of any part of the original pleading the details thereof must also be given with precision."

The complaint is that the application for amendment does not satisfy the above principle. On a perusal of the application for amendment it is seen that the prayer is to correct the amount claimed in the plaint and also to claim interest thereon. This is specifically stated in the petition. This is quite sufficient and the view taken by the Munsiff Cannot be accepted.

4. The finding of the Munsiff that the amendment if allowed will alter the character of the suit cannot be supported. The plaint is based on pattuva-ravu transactions between the parties and it will continue to be so even if the amendment is allowed. The second ground mentioned by the Munsiff has to be overruled. The last ground mentioned by the court below presents some difficulty. In the case before me the original claim and the additional claim sought to be introduced by the amendment are within the jurisdiction of the trial court. But the two claims taken together will fall outside its jurisdiction. The jurisdiction of the court to try a suit is determined by the plaint. Normally therefore the court competent to entertain the suit is entitled to deal with the application for amendment of the plaint. But the question to be considered is whether when the court as a result of allowing the application for amendment is deprived of its jurisdiction to deal with the amended plaint has power to deal with the application for such an

amendment. In Singara Mudaliar v. Govinda-swami Chetty AIR. 1928 Madras 400, a learned single judge of the Madras High Court observed:

"I conceive that no Court will permit a plaint to be so amended as to oust its own jurisdiction to try the suit".

The above principle was invoked by the learned counsel for the respondent. In Bhavani v. Mangamma, AIR. 1949 Madras 208, the view was taken by the Madras High Court that where the claim was originally within the jurisdiction of the Court but falls outside it as a result of the amendment, the Court should, if the application for amendment is allowed, return the plaint for presentation to the proper court. The decision in Singara Mudaliar v. Govindaswami Chetty, AIR. 1928 Madras 400, was followed by another single judge of the Madras High Court in Hagntha Mohamed Nainar v. Vedavalli Ammal (1959) 1 MLJ. 307. The decision in Singara Mudaliar v. Govindaswami Chetty has also been followed in N. R. R. M. H. S. Committee v. P. Atchayya AIR. 1957 A. P. 10.

5. In Lalji v. Narottam AIR. 1953 Nagpu