Govinda Menon, J.-The question referred to the Bench is as follows:

Whether section 18 of the Limitation Act can be invoked to give an extension of lime to an application to set aside a sale under Order 21, rule 90, Civil Procedure Code, in a case in which no allegation or proof of fraud is made or established as against the auction-purchaser”.

The finding concurrently arrived at by both the lower Courts is that the decreee holder was guilty of fraud in that the judgment-debtors were kept out of knowledg-about the sale in the execution proceedings by his act. Order 21, rule 90, Civil Procedure Code, makes it clear that an application under that rule can be made to set aside a sale on the ground of material irregularity or fraud in publishing or conducting it. It means that a material irregularity or fraud must be one antecedent to the sale. It is not likely in the majority of cases that the intending auction-purchaser would have played fraud in publishing or conducting the sale for at that stage he is nowhere in the picture and when the decree-holder himself becomes the purchaser and is guilty of fraud then the application would come within the purview of section 47 of the Civil Proc

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