JUDGMENT

Malik, CJ. - This case was referred to a Full Bench on the ground that the Bench decision in the case of Shiam Sunder Lal Vs. Data Ram and Another, AIR 1946 All 147 was not fully considered by the Full Bench in the case of Saran Singh Vs. L. Miththan Lal, AIR 1946 All 174 .

2. Mr. Isbaq Ahmad has appeared on behalf of the appellants and has raised before us a very ingenious argument which was not advanced before the Bench which made the reference.

3. One Narain had executed a mortgage on 5tb July 1908, in favour of Mahmud Hasan. Khan and others. The mortgagees filed a suit. for sale and obtained a preliminary decree on 31st March 1922. The final decree was passed on 13th December 1924. In the year 1943 the decree-holders filed an application for execution, and the judgment-debtor, Narain, filed an objection. The first point taken in this objection was that the decree had been paid up, the second point was that the application for execution was barred by limitation and, lastly, it was urged that the decree as it stood was not executable and it should be amended under Sections 8 and 9, United Provinces Debt Redemption Act (XIII [13] of 1940) as the judgment-debtor was an agriculturist. The decree-holders filed a reply and in that reply they said that the judgment-debtor had sold the entire mortgaged property to one Bateshwar Dayal under a sale deed dated 30th June 1942, and he had, therefore, no right to make an application for amendment of the decree. The. judgment-debtor gave up the first two objections and it is only the third objection that has survived and which is to be decided by this Court.

4. The executing Court held that the judgment-debtor having transferred the liability the amount due under the decree was not a loan as defined by the Debt Redemption Act and, therefore, the decree could not be amended and the objection was dismissed by an order dated 15th April 1944. On Appeal the lower appellate Court came to a different conclusion and allowed the appeal on 14th September 1944, and directed that the decree be amended in accordance with the provisions of Sections 8 and 9, Debt Redemption Act. It is against that order that the decree-holders have filed this appeal.

5. It is urged on their behalf by Mr. Ishaq Ahmad that the judgment-debtor having transferred the entire mortgaged property and there being no personal liability because the suit on the mortgage was filed after six years and also u/s 21, Debt Redemption Act, the decree-holders could not proceed against the other property of the agriculturist debtor and cannot obtain a decree under Order 34, Rule 6, Civil P.C., the judgment-debtor is not 'a person liable to pay the amount due under the decree' which is the necessary qualification for a person making an application for amendment. Section 8 (1), U.P. Debt Redemption Act, provides:

Notwithstanding the provisions of any decree or of any law for the time being in force, an agriculturist or a workman liable to pay the amount due under a decree to which this Act applies passed before the commencement of this Act, may apply to the civil Court which passed the decree...,for the amendment of the decree by reduction according to the provisions of this Act and the amount due under it....

The section, therefore, requires that an application for amendment of the decree may be made only by an agriculturist "who is liable to pay the amount due under a decree." Mr. Ishaq Ahmad's submissions are that as the judgment-debtor has transferred the entire mortgaged property and as the decree-holders can proceed only against that property and not against the person or other property of the judgment-debtor, after the sale to Bateshwar Dayal the judgment-debtor was no longer 'liable to pay the amount due under the decree.' The argument, as we have said, is very ingenious, and at one stage it appeared to us that there would be no answer to it. We have, however, looked into the sale deed executed in favour of Bateshwar Dayal and we