Atma Ram vs Punjab Financial Corporation and others

Gurdev Singh, J.—On an application u/s 31 of the State Financial Corporation Act, 1951, the Additional District Judge, Ludhiana, by his order dated 27th December, 1966, held that the petitioner Atma Ram and his two partners, Smt. Harnam Kaur and Milkhi Ram were liable to pay to the Punjab Financial Corporation Rs. 1,28,053.65 with interest on this amount at the rate of Rs. 9 1/2% per annum, from February 21, 1965, till the realisation of the entire amount. In addition the learned Judge ordered the sale of the attached property belonging to the petitioner and his partners and further directed that the Punjab Financial Corporation would be entitled to reimburse itself out of the sale proceeds of the attached property for the miscellaneous expenses that it might incur on the account of the present petitioner and his partners in accordance with the terms of the mortgage deed. It is against this order made under sub-section (7) of section 32 of the State Financial Corporation Act, 1951, that Atma Ram has come up in revision to this Court.

This petition for revision purports to have been made u/s 115, Civil Procedure Code, read with section 32(6) of the State Financial Corporation Act 63, of 1951. Besides praying that the final order made by the Additional District Judge on 27th December, 1966, be set aside, the petitioner has challenged an earlier order of the Additional District Judge, dated the 17th December, 1966.

Mr. Balraj Tuli appearing for the respondent-Corporation has taken a preliminary objection that no petition for revision u/s 32(A) of the Act is competent and, in any case, the petitioner''s remedy in this Court by way of revision is time-barred. In this connection he has pointed out that the final order dated 27th December, 1966 against which the petitioner seeks redress, was made u/s 32(7) of the Act and was thus appealable under sub section (9) of that section, which provides that any party aggrieved by an order made under sub-section (7) of section 32, may within 30 days from the date of the order appeal to the High Court. Mr. Tuli argues that since an appeal against this orders lies directly to this Court, no petition for revision can be entertained. The Full Bench decision of this Court in Custodian Evacuee Property v. Nasir ud-Din alias Nisoo ILR (1962) 1 Pb. 231, fully supports him on this point. It is also consistent with the rule laid down by the Supreme Court in Major S.S. Khanna Vs. Brig. F.J. Dillon, . It is well settled that if an appeal against an order lies to this Court, no petition for revision can be entertained u/s 115. Civil Procedure Code. On that short ground the petition for revision so fat as it questions the validity of the final order passed by the Additional District Judge, on 27th December, 1936, under sub-section (7) of section 32, cannot be entertained.

It is true that an appeal against that under lies to this Court. Apart from the fact that there is no prayer for treating this petition as an appeal (conceding for a moment that such a course is open) I find that this petition cannot be treated as an appeal as the period of 30 days prescribed for the appeal under sub-section (9) of section 32, had expired long before this petition was presented to this Court. The order was made on the 27th of December, 1966. The time spent in obtaining the certified copy of the impugned order was 38 days and even after allowing this period the appeal instituted as late as 20th April, 1967, would be still barred by time.

From the office note on the revision, petition, I find that it, was brought to the notice of the petitioner''s counsel that no. petition for revision was competent and he should file an appeal. He, however, did not heed the warning and instead insisted that the petition for revision was competent. In order to get out of the difficulty which was pointed out to him, be quite cleverly inserted that the revision petition was also directed against an earlier order of the Court dated 17th. December, 1966, by which some of the issues had been struck off. Even if the petition be taken as one against the order of 17th December, 1968, it is. haplessly barred by time. Six days were spent in obtaining a certified copy of that order and even that application tar the copy was made long after the expiry of 90 days prescribed under Article 121 of the Limitation Act, 1863.

For all these reasons I hold that this petition for revision is neither competent nor within time. It is, accordingly, dismissed with costs.