The High Court does not have the jurisdiction to receive a plaint which has to be filed in an inferior court in the mofussil and pass interlocutory orders pending the disposal of the suit on the ground that the mofussil court was closed for the vacation.

ORDER: S. R. No. 16033 is a plaint which has to he filed in the Court of the Subordinate Judge of Tirunelveli. The main relief prayed for in the suit is one for injunction against defendants who have been impleaded thereto. C. M. P. No. 3912 of 1957 is an application filed in this court to receive this plaint (S. R. 16033) and transmit the same to the Sub-Court, Tirunelveli after passing an order for interlocutory injunction which, is prayed for in C. M. P. No. 3913 of 1957. The matter came up before me for orders as to the maintainability of the petition C. M. P. No. 3912 of 1957, namely, to receive the plaint.

2. Mr. Champakesa Aiyangar, learned counsel for the petitioner, urged before me various grounds in support of the jurisdiction of this court to receive this plaint. He however conceded that this jurisdiction had ultimately to turn upon the proper construction of Cl. 13 of the Letters Patent.

3. The earliest decision of this court on this point is an unreported one of Seshagiri Aiyar J., in C. M. P. No. 1498 of 1919 (Mad) (A). That was an application to this court to receive a plaint which had to be filed in the District Munsifs court of Dindigul. The learned Judge held that Cl. 13 of the Letters Patent would not enable the plaint to be received by this court.

This decision was followed by Ramesam J., in Jumna Bai v. Ramanathan Chettiar, ILR 52. Mad 52: 55 Mad LJ 690: (AIR 1929 Mad 29) (B). This case arose out of an application made during the summer vacation to entertain a plaint which had to be filed under the Civil Procedure Code in the mofussil court and to pass interim orders which were alleged to be necessary to be passed in the interests of justice.

The learned Judge followed the decision of Seshagiri Aiyar J., referred to just now and held that this plaint could not be entertained here. In the opinion of the learned Judge there was no provision of law by which the High Court could in the first instance receive a plaint which had to be filed in an inferior court in the mofussil and pass interlocutory orders pending the disposal of the suit on the ground that the mofussil court was closed for the vacation.

There has been no dissent from this decision which was rendered in 1928 right up to day and in the practice of this Court there has been no departure, the absence of any decision on this point being due merely to this being accepted as a settled practice with the result that no plaints were sought to be filed in this court until last year. I shall refer to the decision rendered then a little later.

4. As Mr. Champakesa Aiyangar has raised this question once again I propose to deal with the exact scope of the High Courts powers in this regard. It is not necessary to consider the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court which was the predecessor of the present High Courts. Nor is it necessary to examine the scope of the jurisdiction conferred on Sudder Dewaney Adalut which exercised merely appellate jurisdiction over the Companys courts in the moffusil. S. 9 of the High Courts Act, 1851, enacted:

"Each of the High Courts to be established under this Act shall have and exercise all such civil, criminal, admiralty and vice-admiralty, testamentary, intestate and matrimonial jurisdiction, original and appellate, and all such powers and authority for, and in relation to, the administration of justice in the Presidency for which it is established as Her Majesty may by such Letters Patent as aforesaid, grant and direct subject, however, to such directions and limitations as to the exercise of original, civil, and criminal jurisdiction beyond the limits of the Presidency Towns as may be prescribed thereby; and save as by such Letters Patent may be otherwise directed and subject and without prejudice to the legislative powers in relation to the matters aforesaid of the Governor-General of India in Council, the High Court to be established in each Presidency shall have and exercise all jurisdiction and every power and authority