The court highlighted the principles governing amendments of pleadings and the exercise of supervisory jurisdiction as key legal principles established in the judgment.

JUDGMENT :

1. The petitioner invokes supervisory jurisdiction of this Court while seeking quashment of order dated 07.11.2015 (for brevity 'impugned order') passed by the court of City Judge, Jammu (for brevity 'trial court') in case titled as "Bishambar Dass vs. Ganga Ram".

2. A civil suit for permanent prohibitory injunction came to be instituted by the petitioner herein as plaintiff against the respondent herein, impleaded as a defendant, for restraining him from encroaching and raising any constructions on the Gair Mumkin Gali (Path) of the plaintiff measuring 7"X33" Sft. as also to restrain the defendant from interfering in the peaceful possession of the plaintiff thereof.

3. During the pendency of the aforesaid suit an application for amendment of the plaint came to be filed by the plaintiff/petitioner herein on 11.02.2015 seeking amendment in various paras of the plaint detailed out in the said application. The said application came to be dismissed by the trial court in terms of the impugned order. The order is being challenged inter alia on the grounds that the trial court misdirected the principles governing amendments. The amendments sought in essence are stated to have elucidated the suit without converting the injunction suit to any other suit.

The respondent despite having been summoned and served did not choose to either appear or respond to the instant petition.

4. Heard learned counsel for the petitioner and perused the record.

5. Before adverting to the controversy involved in the petition it would be appropriate to refer to the ambit and scope of amendments of the pleadings as contained in Order 6 Rule 17 of the Civil Procedure Code which postulates that the Court may at any stage of the proceedings allow either party to alter or amend his proceedings in such manner and on such terms as may be just, and all such amendments shall be made as may be necessary for the purposes of determining the real question in controversy between the parties.

Law on the subject is no more res-integra that the Court may at any stage of the proceedings allow either party to alter or amend his pleadings, yet it cannot be ignored that such amendment could be allowed, firstly when the suit is at its initial stage i.e., when the trial has not yet begun and secondly, when the proposed amendment sought in the plaint does not change the nature of the suit and thirdly, the application could not be said to have been filed by the party belatedly.

6. The perusal of the record tends to show that the amendment has been sought by the petitioner before the trial court after the parties adduced their respective evidence and after 17 years from the date of institution of the suit. The perusal of the application seeking amendment would reveal that the applicant/petitioner herein has not anywhere spelt out any reason as to why the amendment was being sought after 17 years of the institution of the suit, more so, when the amendment sought had been available with the plaintiff/petitioner herein at the time of institution of the suit or could have been sought at the earliest. No explanation worth the name has been offered in the application as to what prevented the plaintiff/petitioner herein to seek such an amendment in the suit at its infancy stage. An amendment in the pleadings is not available as a matter of right in all circumstances to a party. The amendment, indisputably, is being sought at the fag end of the trial of the case before the trial court, which in the facts and circumstances of the case could not, but said to be either bonafide or just necessary for the purposes of determining the real question in controversy between the parties.

7. Now as to whether exercise of supervisory jurisdiction in the instant case is warranted or not, it would be in the fitness of things to refer to the law laid down by the Apex Court in this regard. The Apex Court in case titled as Shalini Shyam Shetty & Anr. Vs. Rajendra Shankar Patil, reported in 2010 (8) SCC 329