The adjustment must be certified to the Court for recognition, and execution in favor of one only of several joint decree-holders can be allowed only if the court sees sufficient cause for allowing the decree to be executed on an application made by one alone of them.

1. This is an appeal against the order of the District Court of North Arcot on an application to execute the decree of that Court in Original Suit No. 24 of 1901. The application was put in by one only of the two plaintiffs in the suit. The judgment debtors (defendants) in their counter petition contended that a sum of Rs. 3400 was paid to the two plaintiffs in complete satisfaction of the whole decree the balance of the amount due to them (plaintiffs) being remitted in defendants favour. They urged that the two plaintiffs had agreed to certify complete satisfaction of the decree to the Court and subsequently represented to the 1st defendant that they had done so; that the application for execution of the decree was therefore a fraudulent one and should not be allowed by the Court. They also contended that execution should not be allowed in favour of the applicant alone as he was only one of the two decree-holders in the suit. The District Judge was of opinion that he could not recognize the adjustment as it was not certified to the Court. He does not deal in his order with the other objection that execution should not be allowed in favour of one of the decree-holders alone.

2. The judgment debtors Vakil has argued two points. First, that notwithstanding the absence of any certificate of satisfaction, the District Judge was bound to enquire whether, as a matter of fact the decree had been adjusted between the parties or not; and secondly that the judge was wrong in allowing execution in favour of the applicant alone and that he had failed to consider the objection. We are of opinion that the first contention cannot be supported. Section 258 of the old Procedure Code corresponding to Order XXI Rule 2 of the present code lays down that unless such a payment or adjustment has been certified as aforesaid it shall not be recognised as a payment or adjustment of the decree by any Court executing the decree. When an adjustment has been made it is no doubt the duty of the decree-holder to certify the adjustment to the Court; if he fails to certify it is open to the judgment debtor to take steps to compel him to do so and the law allows him 90 days within which to take such steps. The adjustment in the present in case was in the year 1904. The application for execution was in August 1907. In their counter petition the judgment debtors do not state that they were prevented from knowing of the fraudulent conduct of the plaintiffs by any fraud on their part until within 90 days before the date of their application. Section 258 Clause 3, is imperative that the executing court cannot recognize an adjustment which has not been certified. The clause is certainly applicable where in answer to an application for execution an adjustment is set up by the judgment debtor. See Gadadhar Panda v. Shyam Churn Naik (1908) 12 C.W.N. 485. In many cases the failure to certify would be fraudulent, but notwithstanding the fraud the executing Court is bound not to recognize the adjustment. The alleged misrepresentation that it had been certified in this case does not alter the position.

3. We have been invited by the learned Vakil for the appellants to treat the judgment debtors counter petition as an application to compel the judgment creditors to certify the adjustment. We might be inclined to accede to this request if there was anything before us to show that the counter petition was put in within the time allowed to the judgment debtors by the Limitation Act. Their petition was put, in more than three years after the date of the adjustment and we cannot assume that they were not aware of the fraud more than 90 days before the date of the application, even if we could assume that they were at first kept from the knowledge of the fraud in not certifying the adjustment by the conduct of the decree-holders. Mr. Krishnaswami Aiyar has relied on certain cases in support of his contention. The first of these is Ramayyar v. Ramayyar I.L.R. (1897) M. 356 Th