The objection to territorial jurisdiction may be waived, and the principle underlying Section 21 of the Civil Procedure Code is that the objection to territorial jurisdiction is cured entirely and for all purposes.

Phillips, J.

1. This suit (O.S. No. 27 of 1917) has been brought to set aside the final decree in O.S. No. 15 of 1903 in the Kumbakonam Sub-Court and for recovery of the properties comprised therein. The first question we have to deal with in this appeal is whether that decree can be set aside as being absolutely void for want of jurisdiction. It is a decree in a mortgage suit instituted in 1903 when the Kumbakonam Court had jurisdiction over the place wherein the mortgaged property is situated. In 1907 the jurisdiction over this particular place was transferred from the Kumbakonam Court to the Mayavaram Court; and, at the time of passing the final decree, the Kumbakonam Court had no jurisdiction over the place where the mortgage properties lie. The Subordinate Judge, relying on Subbiah Naicker v. Ramanathan Chettiar (1914) ILR 37 M 463 : 26 MLJ 189, has held that this decree was absolutely void, but has, for other reasons, dismissed the plaintiffs suit.

2. In urging the appeal the respondents support the decree on the ground that this finding of the lower Court is not correct; and it is argued that when the case has been properly instituted in a Court and is pending the mere transfer of territorial jurisdiction affecting that case does not transfer the proceedings which were actually pending in the original Court. It is also argued that inasmuch as the plaintiff not only consented to the jurisdiction of the Kumbakonam Sub-Court but actually invoked its jurisdiction in this particular case, he is barred by the principle of Section 21, Civil Procedure Code, from raising the objection now. No doubt, in Subbiah Naicker v. Ramanathan Chettiar (1914) ILR 37 M 462 : 26 MLJ 189, it was observed that, " unless the authority which changes the venue reserved the right to the Court which has lost the jurisdiction to continue pending proceedings affecting the property so transferred to another jurisdiction, such proceedings also, ipso facto, are transferred by the change of venue to the new Court. " This observation in this particular case was made obiter; and when this case was considered by another Full Bench in Seeni Nadan v. Muthuswami Pillai (1919) ILR 42 M 821: 37 MLJ 284, some of the obiter dicta in Subbiah Naicker v. Ramanathan Chettiar (1914) ILR 37 M 462 : 26 MLJ

189. were overruled, although this one was not particularly specified. So long ago as 1900 in Sadasiva Pillai v. Kalappa Mudaliar (1900) ILR 24 M 39 it was held that the right of appeal which existed when the suit was filed in a District Court was not taken away by a subsequent notification which removed the jurisdiction of the District Court to try such a suit and in the course of the judgment, we find the following:--" The District Judge held quite rightly that notwithstanding the notification he had jurisdiction to hear suit on the ground that it had been instituted before the notification came into force. " Similarly in Fedavalli Narasiah v. Mangamma (1903) ILR 37 M 538, it was held that where the jurisdiction of Civil Courts was taken away by Section 33 of Act II of 1894, this did not affect the suit which had been filed in a Civil Court before that section became applicable to the subject-matter of the suit. Again in Subbaraya Mudaliar v. Rakkhi (1908) ILR 32 M. 140 it was held that the Madras Estates Land Act did not take away the jurisdiction of Civil Courts to hear and determine suits which had been taken cognizance of by them before the Act came into operation. It is difficult to discover any difference in principle between those cases and the present case where the territorial jurisdiction has been altered; and in fact, it would appear that when the entire jurisdiction of the Civil Court has been taken away, such removal would apply with more force to pending suits than in a case where the jurisdiction of the Court over the particular place in which the property is situated has alone been removed. A large number of cases have been cited which deal with t