1. Smt. Krishna Devi, petitioner, had filed a suit against Darshan Kumar, respondent, seeking inter alia his ejectment from a shop situated at main Bazar Basholi.

2. She had pleaded that she reasonably required the suit shop for its occupation by Mrs. Sushma, her unemployed daughter-in-law, who wanted to run a Readymade Garment/Cosmetic, Store in the shop.

3. She, while leading her evidence, however, did not produce Sushma, as her witness, and it was after the closure of the evidence of the parties that she requested the trial Court to permit her to produce Sushma, who according to her was an important witness, for the just decision of the case.

4. Learned Munsiff, Basohli, has dismissed her application vide order dated 12-08-2006, aggrieved whereby, she has come to this Court seeking permission to produce Sushma as her witness, and resultantly setting aside of Learned Munsiffs Order.

5. I have considered the submissions made at the Bar.

6. Going by literal construction and strict application of the provisions of Order 18 Rule 17(A) of the Code of Civil Procedure, the impugned order may not warrant any interference; But has such literal construction of the processual provision, by the trial Court, advanced or impeded, the cause of justice -- is the moot question that falls for consideration in this revision petition.

7. The language employed by the draftsman of processual law may be liberal or stringent, but the object of prescribing such procedure for the decision of a lis by a Court of law, is necessarily to advance the cause of justice.

8. The humanist rule that procedure should be the handmaid, and not the mistress, of legal justice vests a residuary power in judges to act ex debito justitiae where the tragic sequel otherwise may be wholly inequitable. It is precisely for this reason that even the Code of Civil Procedure, in its Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure, retains this power of a Court while deciding a case.

9. It is well settled proposition of law that procedure prescribed for deciding a lis, may not be interpreted in such a fashion that it deprives the seeker of justice, of justice, only because it has either remained somewhat indolent in prosecuting its remedy or had been misled by one or the other factors disabling him/her from complying with the procedural requirement(s) in placing appropriately his cause before the Court.

10. The Court while dealing with the lis has, therefore, to be alive to the damage to which an indolent litigant, may be put to, in case of strict application of a procedural provision, and every attempt is required to be made to ensure that litigants indolence or his bonafide inaction in complying with the requirements of a procedural statute, does not come in his way in placing requisite material before the Court which may advance the cause of justice, provided, however, that his adversary is suitably compensated, on such terms as the Court may consider fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the case, so to do.

11. One cannot loose sight of the stark reality that litigants invariably go by the advice of their legal advisors in deciding as to what type of evidence was required to be led in a particular case. Lack of requisite experience in the field and various other factors which may deprive the legal advisors practicing in remote rural areas to remain abrest with the latest law on the subject, at times, contributes to such lapses, which appear to have happened in this case too when the petitioner does not appear to have been advised to examine her daughter-in-law as a witness in the case for whose settlement she had filed the suit to get back the possession of the shop where she had proposed to start her Readymade Garment/Cosmetic, Store to earn her living.

12. While deciding as to whether or not the projected necessity of the petitioner for the occupation of the shop for its use by her daughter-in-law to start business therein, is reasonable and genuine, the statement of Mrs. Sush

Click Here to Read the rest of this document