JUDGMENT

Zafar Ali, J. - The question of law involved in this second appeal is one of limitation.

2. The parties having jointly acquired a site from Government for the purpose of building a shop, entered into a contract beween themselves by which the plaintiff undertook to build a shop on the site-and the defendant agreed to pay him one-third of the cost of construction thereof. The plaintiff's case was that the defendant had paid him Rs. 400 hut refused to pay the balance of the one-third of the cost. On this alleged unpaid balance he claimed interest at I per cent, per mensem. The defendant pleaded inter alia that the suit was barred by time and that no interest was payable. The Court below over ruled both these pleas.

3. As regards the plea of limitation they have held that the rule of limitation applicable to the suit was the one embodied" in Article 61, Schedule 1, Lim. Act of 1908. Under that Article the period of limitation?' is three years but it is enhanced to six: years by the Punjab Limitation Act. It is clear that the plaintiff made no attempt to establish that his suit was within time even if the period of limitation' were three years. It is further clear-that if the suit should not fall within the purview of Article 61 the only other Article that applied was Article 115. Now Article 61 applies where "money is payable to the plaintiff for money paid for the defendant". In the present case it can not be said that the plaintiff had paid any money to any person on behalf of or for the defendant. As it was the plaintiff who constructed the building he and nobody else was primarily liable to pay for the labour and materials used. The masons, etc., and the persons who supplied the materials could hold the plaintiff responsible for payment and there being no contract between them and the defendant the latter incurred no liability to them. So he was not liable to pay any money to them which the plaintiff might have paid them for him. Article 61, was, therefore, not applicable at all. As held in Mahomed Ghasita v. Siraj-ud din A.I.R. 1922 Lah. 198 the Article that applied was Article 115. As decided in that case:

Article 115 is a general provision applying to all actions ex contractu not specially provided for otherwise. The word 'compensation' in that Article as well as in Article 116 has the same meaning as it has in Section 73, Contract Act, and denotes a sum of money payable to a person on account of loss or damage caused to him by the breach of contract.

4. The defendant was guilty of the breach of the alleged contract, inasmuch as he refused to pay what he had agreed to do and thus caused loss to the plaintiff who had laid out money on the strength of the defendant's promise to reimburse him. The suit was barred by limitation as it was not instituted within three years from the date of breach. I, therefore, accept the appeal and reversing the judgment of the Courts below, dismiss the plaintiffs' suit with costs throughout.