JUDGMENT

Braund, J. - This second appeal, the facts of which are substantially the same as the facts in the Second B. Sumat Prasad Vs. Ram Sarup Sastry and Another, AIR 1946 All 204 with which we have already dealt, raises a question of interest and importance. The facts have already been set out in detail, in our judgments in the other appeal, and for the present purpose it will not be necessary to set them out again. The suit out of which this appeal arises is a suit for damages for defamation. The plaintiff, Sheo Dutt Sharma, is an agent of the Hindustan Co-operative Insurance Society Limited of Calcutta and is resident at Nagina. His father, Ram Sarup Shastri, is a Professor of Sanskrit of the Aligarh University and lives at Aligarh. The father owned certain premises within the jurisdiction of the Munsif of Nagina and he had occasion to bring a suit against a neighbour - one Baldeo Sahai - upon cause of action in trespass relating to his premises.

For the purpose of conducting these proceedings before the Munsif of Nagina, Rain Sarup Shastri, not unnaturally, employed his son as his pairokar or agent. He accordingly began his suit for trespass against Baldeo Sahai by a plaint in January 1939.

2. The defendant, Baldeo Sahai, engaged a certain B. Sumat Prasad Jain, an advocate practising at Nagina, to defend the suit and in due course, on 27th March 1939, Sumat Prasad Jain delivered a written statement. This written statement in para. 2 of the "special pleas," contained the following passage:

2. That the plaintiff has no cause of action foe the present suit. All the allegations as to the arising of the cause of action are wrong and the suit of the plaintiff is liable to be dismissed. The present suit has been filed at the instigation of Bhagwan Das, brother of the plaintiff, and an opponent of the defendants, in collusion with Sheo Dutt an "awara" son of the plaintiff in order to harm the defendants.

3. I need hardly say that this passage of the written statement was a piece of idle and provocative pleading, which had no relation to the real issues in the suit and should have been struck out as being unnecessary and scandalous. It is common ground that*the word "awara" is an expression which is highly offensive and bears a meaning indicative of a "vagabond." It is not, I think, denied that its application to a person of normal reputation and standing would be prima facie defamatory of him. Nor, be it said to the credit of the present defendant-appellant, has any attempt been made to justify its application in the written statement to Sheo Dutt Sharma. I need not relate the unfortunate proceedings which followed culminating in an application to the High Court which have been dealt with in the other appeal. The suit out of which this appeal arises is a simple suit by Sheo Dutt Sharma against Baldeo Sahai and his advocate, B. Sumat Prasad Jain, who is the present appellant-defendant for damages for defamation by reason of the application of the epithet "awara" to the plaintiff in para. 2 of the written statement in the suit mentioned above. The suit was tried in the first place by the Munsif of Nagina, who dismissed it on the ground, so far as is now material, that the defendant-appellant was protected by an absolute privilege against any liability for defamation in respect of anything in a pleading drawn by him in his capacity as an advocate. In first appeal the Additional Civil Judge of Bijnore reversed the decree of the Munsif giving the plaintiff a decree for damages on the ground that the use by the defendant-appellant of the defamatory word in the written statement was not privileged, since, in the view he took, it was irrelevant to any issue in the suit. That, as I understand it, stated in its briefest terms, is the matter which we have now to consider in second appeal.

4. The question is one which is important not only because it affects the interests of litigants and of the legal profession, but because it appears to be the