(delivering the judgment of the court): This is an appeal against a receiving and adjudication order by the debtor. The petitioning creditor had in his petition before the High Court disclosed that a judgment debt of $62,220.77 together with interest obtained in Penang High Court Civil Suit No. 436 of 1980 had not been satisfied. The learned judge therefore ruled that an act of bankruptcy under section 3(1)(i) of the Bankruptcy Act had been committed, and consequently granted the order prayed for.

Since the grounds for opposing the petition itself in the court below are substantially the same as those raised in the appeal, it will be pertinent to set out the particulars in some detail. The appellant had alleged in the court below that the judgment entered against him in the aforementioned civil suit was wrong in law because the petitioning creditor's claim contained a "material error" which had influenced the judge (Edgar Joseph Jr. J.) to grant the application to strike out his defence and to enter judgment against him.

The "material error" it seems is in respect of the registered particulars in the Registry of Businesses. In the court below, counsel for the appellant alleged that the particulars relating to his client's withdrawal from the partnership was wrongly registered as being August 23, 1978 whereas the latter had done so on February 1, 1976. Acting on the incorrect particulars issued by the Registrar of Businesses under rule 14(b) of the Registration of Businesses Rules, counsel for appellant continued, the respondent judgment creditor had succeeded in getting the defence struck out and judgment entered against the appellant.

We should pause here to examine what took place at the hearing of the summons-in-chambers in Civil Suit No. 436 of 1980 wherein the order striking out his defence was made.

The application was under Order 18 rule 19(1) (b) & (d), it being alleged that the defence was "frivolous, vexatious and an abuse of the process of the court". It will be seen from the accompanying affidavits and the notes of proceedings (Vol. 1 Pt. C pg. 30/31) that the applicants therein were relying, as they are entitled to do, under section 38(1) of the Partnership Act to treat apparent members of the old firm as still being members until they have notice of the change (the notice of withdrawal of the appellant was not registered by the Registrar until August 23, 1978) and that no affidavit to the effect that respondent had notice of appellant's withdrawal had been filed.

It was also apparent from the judge's notes that the case of Kam Hoy Trading v Hup Aik Tin Mining Company [1967] 2 MLJ 179 was considered, a decision which was affirmed by the Federal Court in Hup Aik Tin Mining Company v Kam Hoy Trading [1969] 1 MLJ 93 which was cited before us by counsel for respondent as authority for the proposition that a person who has habitual dealings with a partnership is entitled to be specifically notified of the withdrawal of the partners, a mere notice to the Registrar of Businesses being insufficient.

There being no affidavit from the appellant alleging the giving of such notice, the respondent's application to have the defence struck out was then granted.

Being out of time to file an appeal, a state of affairs for which the appellant blamed his solicitors, he subsequently applied for leave to appeal out of time to the Supreme Court without success.

For the respondent, Mr. Dulku submits that though this appeal is against the decision of Mohd. Dzaiddin J., it is in effect an appeal against the decision of Edgar Joseph Jr. J. in respect of which appeal the extension of time to appeal was refused by the Supreme Court.

We are unable to be certain about the reason for the failure of the appellants to succeed in their application and would decline to apply the rule in Lye Thai Sang & Anor v Faber Merlin [1986] 1 MLJ 166 (which Mr. Dulku submits should be applied) where this court ruled that having heard and disp