1) Instant Civil 1st appeal is directed against the order dated 01.11.2018, passed by the Court of Additional District Judge, Srinagar

2) The factual backdrop giving rise to the filing of the instant Civil 1st Appeal, as emerge from the pleadings of the parties is as under:—

I. The Respondent herein (hereinafter referred to as the plaintiff) instituted a suit under Order XXXVII of the Code of Civil Procedure (for short the Code) for recovery of an amount of Rs.28.50 lacs(rupees twenty-eight lacs and fifty thousand) with interest @18% against the appellant herein (hereinafter referred to as the defendant).

II. In the suit, it is alleged that the defendant deals in sale and purchase of land as well as sale of constructed houses and shops at Baramulla and Srinagar. The plaintiff, in the year 2009, paid an amount of Rs.28.50/ lacs to the defendant in various installments for purchase of land at Umerabad near Narbal Masjid. The defendant after showing the land, put the plaintiff in possession of 02 kanals of land after receiving the suit amount out of which Rs.1.50/ lacs were to be paid at the time to registration. The plaintiff immediately started filling the land and dumped stones but while the work was going on, some locals stopped him and told that the land actually belongs to them which resulted in dispute between the plaintiff and the defendant. It was learnt by the plaintiff that the defendant had some dispute with the land owners to whom the payment was not made. The plaintiff demanded the amount back from the defendant. With the intervention of some friends of the parties, the defendant admitted to repay the amount of the plaintiff, as a result thereof, he executed a hundi wherein he promised to pay the amount by or before 15.07.2010.

III. It has also been pleaded in the suit that the defendant did not pay the said amount in terms of hundi despite repeated requests and reminders and later on offered to give some shops to the plaintiff out of a complex which the defendant was constructing at Jadeed Baramulla. However, after construction was completed, the defendant refused to given any shop to the plaintiff. When the defendant did not pay the amount to the plaintiff despite repeated requests, the plaintiff filed suits under Order XXXVII of the Code of Civil Procedure (for short the Code) for recovery of an amount of Rs.28.50 lacs(rupees twenty-eight lacs and fifty thousand) with interest @18% against the defendant, as referred above.

IV. On being served with the notice, the defendant entered appearance before the trial court through counsel on 30.01.2016. The learned trial court directed the defendant to file an application seeking leave to defend and, accordingly, he filed an application seeking leave to defend under and in terms of Order under Order XXXVII Rule 3 CPC, on the following grounds:—

i. That the suit filed by the plaintiff under Order 37 of the Code of Civil Procedure is not maintainable on the ground of territorial jurisdiction. Since the “Hundi’ as is alleged by the plaintiff has been executed in the year 2010 on 05.02.2010 at Baramulla, in terms of Section 20 of the Code of Civil Procedure, any suit other than the normal suit is required to be filed at a place where the defendants resides or carries on his business. The plaintiff, by taking recourse to fraud very cleverly withheld such a fact from his pleadings in the suit, in fact, the plaintiff has not even mentioned in his suit the area of jurisdiction in which this suit would lie, so as to mislead the court from the essential point of jurisdiction. Thus, the plaintiff has maintained a clandestine silence, aimed at deceiving and misleading this Court about the territorial limits within which the instant suit could have been instituted. Since the Court lacks jurisdiction to prosecute such a matter, such infirmity going to the root of lis, the suit is liable to be dismissed in limini;

ii. That since the Hundi as is alleged by the plaintiff to have be