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Judgment
Subrahmanyam, J.—This is an application by the first Defendant to revoke the leave granted to the Plaintiff in Application No. 1144 of
1957, to institute the suit in this Court. The Plaintiff married the first Defendant in the City of Madras in 1946. He was and continues to be
employed in Calcutta. The Plaintiff and the first Defendant lived together in Calcutta after the marriage until some time in 1955. From about the
middle of 1955, the Plaintiff has been living in Madras. This suit relates to the proceedings in Original Suit No. 632 of 1956, on the file of the
Calcutta High Court. The proceedings in that suit, taking them at their face value, disclose the following facts:-The Plaintiff instituted that suit u/s 13
of the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955, praying for dissolution of her marriage with the first Defendant. The ground urged was that he was living in
adultery with the second Defendant. The first Defendant did not appear in that suit. The Plaintiff sent an affidavit from Madras proving her case.
The affidavit was used by her solicitor on instructions received from her. For permission to use the affidavit as evidence, the solicitor used a
medical certificate sent by the Plaintiff in which the doctor certified that she was not in a fit state of health to proceed to Calcutta to give evidence in
the suit. The Court accepted the affidavit, found the Plaintiff�s case proved and passed a decree for divorce dissolving her marriage with the first
Defendant.
In this suit, the Plaintiff prays, (1) for a declaration that the cause papers and other papers filed in Original Suit No. 632 of 1956, on the file of
the Calcutta High Court are forged documents obtained from the Plaintiff by reason of fraud and deception practised on her by the first Defendant
and that, therefore, the decree passed in that suit is illegal, null and void and not binding on the Plaintiff, and that it may be set aside; (2) that a
declaration be granted that the marriage between the Plaintiff and the first Defendant is still subsisting and is valid; and (3) that a declaration be
granted that the marriage between the first and second Defendants is illegal and bigamous. Declaration (3) is asked for, because, subsequent to the
decree of divorce passed by the Calcutta High Court, the first Defendant married the second Defendant. The first Defendant states in these
proceedings that his marriage with the second Defendant has since been dissolved.
The allegations of fact on which the Plaintiff claims the reliefs set out above are these: the first Defendant obtained her signature to the document
which she now infers was the plaint filed in that suit, by concealing from her the contents of that document and misrepresenting to her the nature of
the document and the purpose for which her signature was obtained to that document. Mr. Adiga, an Advocate of this Court, acting on the first
Defendant''s instigation and on false representations, procured her signature in the affidavit which she now finds has been used as her affidavit to
prove the claim said to have been made by her in the plaint instituted in her name. She was not aware at any time during the pendency of those
proceedings or on the date of the passing of the decree in that suit that a suit was being, or had been, instituted in her name or that a decree for
dissolution of the marriage would be or was about to be passed in any such suit. She learnt about that decree much later.
Along with the plaint in this suit, the Plaintiff presented Application No. 1144 of 1957, praying for leave to institute the suit in this Court. Leave
was granted ex parte. The first Defendant prays that the leave be revoked.
The first reason alleged in support of this application to revoke the leave is that no part of the cause of action arose in the City of Madras.
Learned Counsel for the applicant contends that the cause of action for the suit consists only of the proceedings had, and the decree passed, in the
High Court of Calcutta and that consequently no part of the cause of action arose within the limits of this Court''s Ordinary Original Civil
Jurisdiction. Cause of action, by the definition which is now part of the vocabulary of the law, consists of the bundle of facts which a Plaintiff should
prove in order to entitle him to the relief claimed. In order that the Plaintiff in this suit might become entitled to the reliefs claimed in the plaint, she
would have to prove that, to the document which she now finds was presented in the Calcutta High Court as her plaint, her signature was taken by
fraud and that the proceedings before the Commissioner of Oaths, by which she is alleged to have sworn to the affidavit which was used in the suit
to prove the case set out in the plaint alleged to have been filed by her, were also proceedings in which she played a part which, by fraud and
misrepresentation, she was induced by the first Defendant''s friends to play, without knowing the real purposes for which she was required to act in
that manner. But the Calcutta High Court, believing that the plaint had been instituted by her and that the plaint and the affidavit presented to the
Court were entitled to their face value, accepted the affidavit and passed a decree. Every one of these facts would have to be proved by the
Plaintiff before she would become entitled to the reliefs prayed for in this plaint. The cause of action, in other words, does not consist merely of the
end of the story, namely, the events that happened in the High Court at Calcutta but consists of the beginning, the middle and the end; that is to say,
of the entire story commencing with the vague hints that the first Defendant made to the Plaintiff in Madras of the help she would have to render
him to extricate him out of an ugly situation and ending with the decree for divorce. It may often happen that the substance of the cause of action is
concentrated in the beginning of the story while the end is merely formal. That perhaps is the case here. It may, in other cases, happen that the
story begins innocuously and the sting is in the tail. In either case, the beginning, the middle and the end form parts of the cause of action. I hold
that, where a part of the facts which entitled a Plaintiff to have a decree set aside occur within the limits of the jurisdiction of a Court other than the
Court which passed the decree, a suit to set aside the decree may, subject to leave being granted in appropriate cases, be instituted either in such
other Court or in the Court which passed the decree.
In support of the proposition that, except where, in pursuance of the decree, action has been taken in a Court other than the Court which
passed the decree, in which event such other Court may have jurisdiction to entertain a suit to set aside the decree, the Court which passed the
decree is the only Court which has jurisdiction to entertain the suit to set aside the decree, learned Counsel for the applicant relies on Bibee
Soloman v. Abdul Aziz (1879) 4 C.L.R. 366. In that case, a decree had been passed by the Calcutta High Court and the suit to set aside the
decree was instituted in that Court. There could be no question on the facts that the Calcutta High Court had jurisdiction to entertain and try the
suit. The question whether any other Court had jurisdiction to entertain the suit did not arise for determination and the observation in that judgment
that the Calcutta High Court alone had jurisdiction is obiter. Learned Counsel relies on Umrao Singh v. Hardeo I.LR(1907) All. 418. In that case,
a decree passed by the Small Causes Court at Calcutta was transferred for execution to a Court in Uttar Pradesh. Nothing had been done in Uttar
Pradesh by way of executing the decree. The Allahabad High Court held that a suit to set aside the decree could be instituted only in Calcutta.
That, again, is not a case where any part of the events which constituted the Plaintiff�s cause of action for praying for the relief that the decree of
the Small Causes Court at Calcutta be set aside, happened anywhere outside Calcutta. I find that part of the cause of action for this suit arose
within the City of Madras and that, subject to leave being granted, this Court has jurisdiction to entertain and try the suit.
The next ground on which it is prayed that leave be revoked is that this Court has not exercised its discretion properly in granting leave. The
substance of the cause of action pleaded in this case has its seat in Madras. The deception and the fraud are alleged to have taken place at
Madras. The witnesses who have to prove or disprove the facts alleged by the Plaintiff in relation to the deception and the fraud live in Madras.
The Plaintiff would have to examine herself; and probably one side or the other might examine the medical officer who issued the certificate on the
basis of which the Calcutta High Court permitted her to use her affidavit as evidence, and the Commissioner of Oaths. There may be other persons
whom the parties might examine to prove or disprove the facts stated by the Plaintiff to have taken place in Madras in relation to her signing the
document used as her plaint in Calcutta, the letters, if any, to the solicitor at Calcutta, and the affidavit which was used as evidence in the case. It is
true that first Defendant who is residing at Calcutta would have to be examined in the suit. The solicitor who acted for the Plaintiff might also have
to be examined. But he had not met the Plaintiff or taken instructions from her in person. Therefore, he would probably have only to file the letters
said to have been received from her. The first Defendant''s brother who is living in Calcutta may also have to be examined. But, both the first
Defendant and his brother have their mother living in Madras and they have facilities for staying in Madras while they are being examined here. On
the other hand, to compel the Plaintiff to go to Calcutta to examine herself and her witnesses might virtually be to deprive her of any opportunity to
prove her case, assuming, of course, that her case is true. The balance of convenience, therefore, is clearly in favour of the suit being instituted at
Madras instead of a similar suit being instituted at Calcutta.
I find that the grant of leave is proper. The application is dismissed. No costs.