Sarjoo Prosad, C.J.—The preliminary point which Bhandari J. has referred for our consideration is "Whether under the facts and circumstances of this case, an appeal against the order of the Civil Judge, Alwar dated the 22nd of March 1954 lay to the High Court or to the District Judge, Alwar," The reference has been necessitated because the learned Judge was doubtful of the view taken by Modi, J. in some earlier decisions of this Court to which reference will be made in due course.

2. The facts relevant to the context have been aptly summed up by Bhandari J. The plaintiff instituted the suit to which the appeal relates for recovery of over Rs. 6,000/-from the defendants in the court of the Civil Judge, Alwar, on July 26, 1948. The learned Civil Judge dismissed the suit on the 22nd of March, 1954. It is important to remember that at the time of the institution of the suit, the Alwar State Civil Procedure Code, 1947 (No. 16 of 1947) was in force in the erstwhile Alwar State. The law reining to Civil Courts was provided in the United States of Matsya Civil Courts Ordinance, 1948 (No. 5 of 1948) promulgated on the 28th of March 1948 which applied to Alwar also and under sec. 10 of this Ordinance, the institution of the suit in the court of the Civil Judge, Alwar was proper. The above Ordinance also provided for the forum of appeals. Sec. 16 referred to cases where an appeal would lie to the High Court at Matsya from the decree or order of a District Judge or an Additional District Judge, while sec. 17 provided for appeals from the decree or order of Munsiff or that of a Civil Judge. Sub-sec. 2 of sec. 17 which is material to the discussion runs as follows: —

"(2) Save as otherwise provided by any enactment for the time being in force an appeal from a decree or order of a Civil Judge, passed on the original side, shall lie to the District Judge, and in and other case to the High Court".

Under the above provision, the appeal from the decree of the Civil Judge in the instant case lay to the District Judge This ordinance was repealed by the Rajasthan Civil Courts Ordinance, 1950 (No. 7 of 1950). By virtue of sec. 5 of this Ordinance, all courts constituted under the repeal law were deemed to have been respectively constituted under the Ordinance. Sec. 21 of the Rajasthan Civil Courts Ordinance, (which has formed the main subject of discussion) as it stood at the time of the filing of the appeal, provided that appeal against the decree or order of the Civil Judge should be presented to the High Court, if the value of the original suit in which the decree or order was made exceeded Rs. 5,000/-. It is on the strength of this provision that the appeal was filed to this Court. It is not relevant to refer to the subsequent amendments to the section.

3. At the hearing of the appeal, a preliminary objection was taken that the appeal should have been filed in the court of the District Judge, Alwar and not in the High Court. This argument is based on sec. 17(2) of the United State of Matsya Civil Courts Ordinance under which as shown above, an appeal from a decree or order of the Civil Judge passed on the original side lay to the District Judge. It is contended that it is this section which would operate to govern the forum of appeal, and not sec. 21 of the Rajasthan Civil Court Ordinance, which repealed the earlier Ordinance, specially when the court to which the appeal lay continued to subsist, even after the repeal. The forum of appeal is to be determined not by the change in the law at the time when the decree was passed but by the law as it was at the date of institution of the suit because a right of appeal is not merely a procedural right but a substantive right of the parties, which could not be affected by any repeal unless the law provided for it expressly or by necessary intendment. The argument found favour with Modi J. in two earlier decisions of this Court. In the case of Nandlal vs. Mt. Chotan (Civil First Appeal No. 64/1952, decided

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