Modi, J.—This is a civil regular second appeal by the defendants against the judgment and decree of the District Judge, Bikaner, dated the 27th January, 1962, affirming the judgment and decree of the Civil Judge, Bikaner dated the 7th November, 1960, in a suit for recovery of mortgage money by sale of the property under mortgage. The appeal raises an interesting question as to the applicability of O. 2, r. 2 C.P.C.

2. The material facts are these. On the 5th December, 1949, Mst. Lali, widow of Rambux together with her son Ramnath, made a mortgage for a sum of Rs. 4000/- in favour of one Sohanlal Vyas with respect to the suit house. The plaintiffs are the legal representatives of the deceased Sohanlal. The defendant Mst. Tulcha is the daughter-in-law of Mst. Lali, wife of the said Ramnath, in whose favour Mst. Lali had made a will with respect to the house in question. The mortgage-deed is Ex. I. On the 19th May, 1953, the mortgagees instituted a suit for the recovery of Rs. 797/- as interest on the mortgage money. In this suit, they prayed only for a personal decree against the defendants. This suit was admittedly decreed as prayed. Thereafter on the 8th October, 1959, the plaintiffs mortgagees brought the present suit for recovery of the principal sum of Rs.4000/- relinquishing altogether their claim for interest on the ground that the mortgaged property was not likely to be sold for more than the principal money. The defendants Ramnath and his wife Mst. Tulcha filed separate written statements and raised a number of pleas; but it is (unnecessary to mention any of them save that which mainly arises for determination in this appeal. That plea is that the plaintiffs present suit was barred by virtue of O. 2, r. 2 C.P.C. in view of the fact that they had brought an earlier suit in connection with the mortgage for recovery of interest only, in 1953. This plea was rejected by both courts below and the plaintiffs suit was decreed. The defendants have now come up in second appeal to this Court.

3. The main question raised by learned counsel for the defendants, therefore, is that the view taken by the courts below that the present suit was not barred by O. 2 r. 2 C.P.C. in the circumstances of the case is incorrect. The contention of learned counsel is that the plaintiffs could not have split up their claim against the defendants mortgagors in view of the provisions of O. 2, r. 2 inasmuch as the cause of action in the case of both the suits was the same, to wit, the mortgage, and that where a cause of action enables a man to seek for larger and wider relief than that to which he limits his claim, he cannot afterwards seek to recover the balance by independent proceedings.

4. Now, in order to dispose of the above question properly, it is necessary to look at the terms of the mortgage-deed Ex. 1. Apart from mentioning that Mst. Lali and her son Ramnath had borrowed a sum of Rs. 4000/- from Sohanlal on the security of the suit house and that they had agreed to pay interest at the rate of one per cent, per mensem, what the deed said was that the mortgagors would pay Rs. 40/-1 as interest month by month and that should they fail to pay interest for six months at any time, such interest would be treated as principal and they would be liable to pay interest on such amount at the stipulated rate. What then follows is highly important for the purposes of the controversy raised between the parties and it is this.

"Should the mortgagors fail to pay the entire money due on demand, the mortgagees would be at liberty to file a suit for the recovery thereof both by sale of the mortgaged property as well as by a personal decree against the mortgagors. Besides this, the mortgagees would have the right to file a separate suit for the amount of the interest which may fall in arrear and the decree so obtained would be executable against the person of the mortgagors and their other property."

It is thus crystal clear from a perusal of the mortgage-deed that

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