The main legal point established in the judgment is that a delay in making up the deficiency in the court-fees stamp may be condoned if it is due to a bona fide mistake of fact or law, but not if it is due to negligence or lack of legal skill.

NAWAL KISHORE, J.

( 1 ) THIS judgment will dispose of two appeals Nos. 10, 12/1948. 49 as they have arisen out of the same case. The facts relating to them are stated in detail in a single bench judgment of this Court dated 14th September 1946 in Civil Appeal case no. 160/1942-43 and therefore only such facts will be set out in this judgment as are directly relevant to the points agitated by the learned counsel in this Court.

( 2 ) THIS litigation between the parties arose out of a dispute relating to certain salt business done by them in partnership. It is common ground that at pachpadra salt business was carried on by the Government of Jodhpur and the british Government separately and this consisted of transporting salt from the salt pits to the Pachpadra railway station. The work of transporting the salt in connection with the business carried on by the British Government was done by messrs. Badrinarain Chandan Mal, whereas Messrs. Gangabnx Gulabrai were agents of the Government of Jodhpur, It appears that Badrinarain entered into a partnership with Aaaram. The partnership however was to be carried on in the name and style of Badrinarain Chandanmal with equal shares. Messrs gangabux Gulabrai, who as mentioned above, were contractors of the Jodhpur government, appointed the partnership as their agents, while Asaram entrusted the entire work to Ramchand and Daliohand. Thus the partnership came to be put in charge of the entire business that is, the business carried on both by the british Government and the Government of Jodhpur. The firm did the business of transporting a certain amount of salt during the period of the partnership and at the rate fixed certain income resulted, Badrinarain served a notice upon asaram calling upon him to render account of the entire business, but since he failed to do so a suit for rendition of account was instituted. In this suit Asaram was of course a necessary party, but Gangabux Gulabrai and Ramchand and dalichand were also im-pleaded; why, the learned counsel for the plaintiff appellant is not able to explain. In fact he concedes that they were not necessary parties to this litigation. This is not the only lapse which has occurred in this case, It appears to me that the plaint is also very unhappily worded as while it appears to show that the plaintiff is calling for a rendition of accounts relating to the business of salt done by the Government of Jodhpur only a perusal of the last paragraph shows that the plaintiff was asking for an account of the entire business done by the partnership. The details in the plaint relate mostly to the business of salt done by the Government of Jodhpur, but a reading of the entire plaint leaves no doubt whatsoever that it covered both the businesses done by the partnership. It is this unhappy phraseology of the plaint which has suggested a contention to the mind of the learned counsel for the defendant at a very late stage of this litigation and that is that since the plaint was confined to a rendition of account relating to the business done by the government of Jodhpur only and the partnership had maintained a common account for both the businesses and the account relating to the aforesaid business could not be separated, the suit was liable to be dismissed. This has been mentioned at this stage only to point out the unhappy wording of the plaint and the contention of the learned counsel will be dealt with in detail later on. For the purpose of the disposal of of this appeal it is not necessary to recite the pleadings in detail and it will be sufficient to state that after the suit had been dismissed by the lower appellate Court, there was a second appeal to this court and the contention raised by the defendant Asaram was stoutly put for ward and that was that as a matter of fact, no deed of partnership had been executed between the parties. The learned Judge in chambers however, discussed that matter in detail with reference to the evidence pr