Modi, J.—This is a second appeal by the plaintiff Ramdas and others in a suit for damages for defamation.

2. The plaintiff was the Pujari of Shri Raghunathjis temple in village Sanwatra at all material times. The defendants are residents of that village. The plaintiffs case was that the defendants made an application on Posh Vadi, 11, Svt. 1998 to the Mahkma Khas of the State of Mewar, as it then was, and later during the course of an enquiry emanating from that application gave statements before the Assistant Settlement Officer on the 3rd May, 1945, in which they stated that the plaintiff was not a man of good character, that he did not perform the worship of the temple regularly or properly, that when he was being asked to perform the worship properly he assumed an attitude of aggression and behaved violently, that he had blocked the way to the temple and that he also beat the gwalas, both women and men, when they brought firewood from the jungle, and, therefore, he was not fit be allowed to continue as a Pujari of the temple. The plaintiffs contention was that all these allegations were false and defamatory, and, there fore he claimed damages to the extent of Rs. 500/- from the defendants. This suit was brought on the 5th February 1947.

3. The defendants admitted that they had made an application to the Mehkma Khas of the former State of Udaipur that the plaintiff being the Pujari of the temple was not performing the worship regularly or properly, and that the plaintiff was in the habit of acting violently whenever he was reminded of his duties, but they contended that whatever they had done, they did in the performance of their duty as they were interested in the proper worship of the temple of the village and that the complaint against the plaintiff was true infact and substance. The Munsiff Rajsamand who tried the suit decreed it and awarded damages in favour of the plaintiff as claimed. The defendants then went in appeal and the learned Civil Judge, Udaipur, before whom the appeal came for disposal dismissed the suit. The present appeal has been filed from the aforesaid judgment and decree.

4. It is to be regretted that both courts below have mis-directed themselves in the trial of this suit, and their judgments are more or less superficial and perfunctory, and the real issues which arise in the case have been completely missed. The trial court was obviously of the opinion that an executive enquiry had been ordered as respects the complaint of the defendant and that it was found by the officers concerned that the complaint was false, and therefore, it come to the conclusion that the defendants had made themselves liable to the plaintiff for damages and consequently decreed the suit in to. I desire to point out that it was not right for the trial court to have based its finding upon the decision arrived at by the executive authorities in this connection. The trial court should have decided the case on the material which was placed before it, and not on the extra judicial finding of certain executive officers of the State.

5. Turning to the judgment of the learned Civil Judge, I cannot help stating that his judgment is equally unsatisfactory. The learned Civil Judge dismissed the suit on a number of grounds, the one important ground being that the plaintiff had failed to prove facts or circumstances by which injury to his mind and reputation could have been assessed in terms of money, and that in the absence of such evidence, the damages awarded by the trial court were entirely arbitrary. It is difficult to understand what the learned Civil Judge meant by this. The plaintiff had claimed a sum of Rs. 500/- as general damages and not as special damages, and the learned Civil Judge obviously was not conscious of the legal principle which is well established that general damages are not required to be proved specifically. The learned Civil Judge further held that the plaintiff should have established by evidence how and to what e

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