The court fee payable on the Memorandum of Appeal should be as per the fee that would be payable in the court of first instance on the subject-matter of the appeal.

K. MOHAN RAM, J.

1.The above matter has been posted before us for deciding the issue as to whether the court fee paid on the Memorandum of Appeal in this case by the appellant is proper or not?

2. Mr. M. Devendran, learned counsel for the appellant submitted that originally the suit was filed on the Original Side of this Court on 15.12.2006 and was numbered as C.S.No.557 of 2007. Thereafter, because of the enlargement of the pecuniary jurisdiction of the City Civil Court, Chennai the suit was transferred to the City Civil Court and later, transferred to the Additional District and Sessions Court/Fast Track Court at Chennai and it was renumbered as O.S.No.9953 of 2010. He further submitted that the Government has issued a Government Order, under which in respect of the suits transferred from the Original Side of the High Court to the City Civil Court the plaintiff need not pay ad-valorem court fee, but the Court fee already paid before the High Court is sufficient; now the suit has been disposed of, by the judgment dated 10.05.2007 and being aggrieved by that, the above appeal has been filed.

3. According to the learned counsel for the appellants, under Section 52 of the Tamil Nadu Court Fees and Suits Valuation Act, 1955 (hereinafter will be referred to as the Act) the fee payable in an appeal shall be the same as the fee that would be payable in the court of first instance on the subject-matter of the appeal. According to the learned counsel, the Court of first instance in this case in the High Court; because the suit was originally filed on the Original Side of this court and it cannot be said that the City Civil Court is the Court of first instance and therefore, according to the learned counsel, under Section 52 of the Act, the Court fee that was paid in the plaint before this Court is the fee that is payable on the Memorandum of Grounds of appeal.

4. Since the Registry has not accepted the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant, the matter has been placed before us.

5. Wehave considered the said submissions made by the learned counsel for the appellant, and perused the materials available on record.

6. The facts are not in dispute, namely, that the suit was originally filed before the Original Side of this Court and later it was transferred to the City Civil Court, Chennai and renumbered and has been disposed of by the learned Additional District and Sessions Judge, Fact Track Court No. V. Chennai. In this context, it will be useful to refer to the provisions of Appendix 1-A of the High Court Fees Rules, 1956 which reads as follows;-

7. A reading of the aforesaid provision shows that the Court fee payable is on the slab rate as prescribed in the aforesaid appendix and not on ad-valorem rate which is applicable to other courts of original jurisdiction.S.No.1 of the above appendix makes it very clear that the court-fee payable on the Memorandum of Appeal from a judgment passed by the High Court in exercise of its Ordinary Original Civil Jurisdiction and not otherwise provided for an Article 3, Schedule II to the Tamil Nadu Court-fees and Suits Valuation Act XIV of 1955, presented to the High Court, is as per the slab rate provided therein. Admittedly, in this case, the above appeal is not filed against the judgment passed by the High Court in exercise of its Ordinary Original Civil Jurisdiction but the appeal has been filed against the decree and judgment made in O.S.No.9953 of 2010 dated 10..5.2011 by the Court of the learned Additional District and Sessions Judge, Fast Tract Court No V, at Chennai. The judgment appealed against has not been passed by the learned Single Judge by exercising the ordinary jurisdiction on the Original Side of this Court. Therefore, in our considered view the Provisions contained in Appendix 1-A of the High Court Fees Rules, 1956 is not applicable to the above appeal.

8. A reading of Section 52 of the Act shows that the fee payable in an appeal shall be the same as the fee