Chang Min Tat J:

In Civil Suit No. 232 of 1967 instituted on 12 May 1967, the plaintiff sued for (i) a declaratory order that three charges executed by the plaintiff in favour of the defendant over a certain piece of land were void and unenforceable as against the plaintiff, the defendant being an unlicensed moneylender, (ii) an order for the return of the issue document of title, and (iii) an order that the Collector of Land Revenue, Kuala Kangsar, cancel the entries of such charges in the land register.

Prior to the institution of the action in the High Court, the defendant had applied, in Foreclosure Application No. 5 of 1966, to the Collector of Land Revenue, Kuala Kangsar, under s. 260 of the National Land Code for sale of the land. The application came up for hearing on 5 June 1967, on which date the hearing was adjourned to 20 June 1967, it being suggested to the plaintiff that he should, in the meantime, apply to the High Court under s. 447 of the National Land Code.

Acting on this suggestion, the plaintiff by his solicitor on 8 June 1967, took two courses. In the first place, he applied by registered letter under s. 28(2) of the National Land Code for a postponement of the hearing of the enquiry into the application for sale to a date to be fixed after the determination of the civil action in the High Court. Secondly, on the same day and acting on the suggestion of the Collector of Land Revenue, Kuala Kangsar, he filed an application in the action by way of a summons-in-chambers for an order that all proceedings in the defendant's application before the Collector of Land Revenue, Kuala Kangsar, be stayed until further order.

When the summons-in-chambers came up before me, objection was taken by Counsel for the defendant to the form of the application. It was submitted that the application should have been by way of an originating summons, and that if s. 447 of the National Land Code applied, the reference therein to a summons-in-chambers was plainly wrong as any application not in a pending cause or matter must, by the Rules of the Supreme Court, be made in an originating summons.

That submission is, in my view, correct but only partly correct.

Section 447(1), which reads as follows:

447. (1) Nothing in this Act shall affect the operation of any rules of Court; and, if any provision of this Act is inconsistent with any provision of any rules of Court, the latter provision shall prevail and the former provision shall, to the extent of the inconsistency, be void.

provides, in the event of inconsistency, for the prevalence of any rules of Court over any provision in the National Land Code, so that unless it is a pending cause or matter, any application to the High Court must be by way of originating summons in accordance with the Rules of the Supreme Court.

As to sub-section (2) of s. 447, which reads as follows:

(2) A person or body seeking to take proceedings in the Court under this Act, and any party to the proceedings so taken, may apply to the Court by summons in chambers for procedural directions in respect of any matter not provided for; and the Court on any such application may make such order as it considers appropriate"

it refers to proceedings in the High Court under the Act, and directs that in "proceedings so taken", any party thereto may apply for procedural directions in a matter not provided for. In my view, the civil action cannot be said to be proceedings under the Act, and an application for stay of the Collector of Land Revenue's enquiry is not an application for procedural direction and cannot be made under this particular section. Nor is it in respect of any matter not provided for.

In the matter of stay of the Collector of Land Revenue's enquiry in a chargee's application for stay, there is the provision in s. 37 of the National Land Code for appeal to the Court from any decision or order given in the enquiry. What the decision of the Collector of Land Revenue, Kuala Kangsar, to