Mrs. Hema Ramasubbu Director Mahalakshmi Media Private Limited 167/ 1, Peters Road, Royapettah Chennai vs A. Albert and four others

D. Murugesan, J.—The petitioner is the 2nd respondent in I.A. No. 23 of 2001 and 10th defendant in O.S. No. 15 of 2001 on the file of

the learned District Munsif Tiruchirappalli. The petition has filed the present Civil Revision Petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India

challenging the order dated 5.1.2001 and modified on 12.1.2001 passed by the learned District Munsif, Trichy in I.A. No. 23 of 2001 in O.S.

No. 15 of 2001. The respondents are the plaintiffs in the suit. The respondents have filed the said suit for a judgment and decree of permanent

injunction restraining the defendants 1 to 8 from according any sanction or licence or permission or authentication of any kind of approval in favour

of defendant No. 9 for printing and publishing its Trichy edition of the Tamil daily ""Kalai Kadhir"" from the suit property and restraining) the

defendants 9 to 12 from carrying on the business of printing and publishing its Trichy Edition of the Tamil daily ""Kalai Kadhir"" from the suit

property. Pending the above suit, the plaintiffs filed I.A. No. 23 of 2001 seeking for a similar prayer of injunction. By order dated 5.1.2001 the

learned District Munsif granted ad-interim injunction till 12.1.2001. When the matter was taken on 12.1.2001 the said ad-interim injunction was

extended.

The learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner would contend on the following grounds namely:-

(1) the suit itself is not maintainable in as much as there cannot be an injunction against the functionaries of the Government to consider the

application for grant of licence or permission to run an industry in discharge of their duty,

(2) there is no question of grant of any interim injunction on the ground of anticipated decision when, admittedly the petitioner has not started the

business in the premises in question and

(3) when there is no application under Order 6, Rule 8 for granting interim injunction when factually there was no imminent danger as apprehended

by the plaintiffs.

In this connection, the learned counsel relied upon a judgment of the Supreme Court reported in "" 2000(2) MCJ 910 = 2000-3 L.W. 354 (Kuldip

Singh v Subhash Chander Jain & ors.

On the other hand, the learned counsel for the respondents submitted that in the affidavit filed in support of I.A. No. 23 of 2001, specific

allegation of danger has been pleaded and even in the plaint it has been pleaded that the building is in a dilapidated and dangerous condition and

therefore the contention of the learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner that injunction cannot be granted for anticipated nuisance is not correct

factually. Even otherwise, these are all disputed questions that are to be gone into by the trial Court. When such apprehension is expressed by the

plaintiffs the trial Court is competent to go into the matter of entertaining the application even in case of grant of licence or permission to start the

industry. Further, the learned counsel for the respondents submitted that in the matter of grant of injunction this Court sitting in Article 227 will not

normally interfere and for the said purpose the learned counsel relied upon a judgment of the Supreme Court reported (in 2001-1-L.W. 429 =

AIR 2000 SC 3032 ( A. Venkatasubbiah Naidu v Chellappan and others)"". Further the learned counsel submitted that the petitioner has already

filed an application under Order 7, Rule 7 to reject the plaint and therefore it is for the petitioner to canvass its rights under the said application and

the proper remedy is not filing the present Civil Revision Petition before this Court.

I have considered the rival submissions. It is true that in the matter of statutory functions to be performed by the officers the Court will not

normally grant any injunction restraining the authorities from performing their statutory duties. However, the question of entertaining the suit on the

anticipated nuisance based upon the averments made by the plaintiffs and the defendants are to be considered only by the learned District Munsif

before whom the suit is pending. Further when the apprehension of anticipated nuisance has been pleaded by the plaintiffs and the same has been

disputed by the defendants it would not be proper to embark upon the rival claim of the plaintiffs and the defendants by this Court sitting under

Article 227 of the Constitution of India. Moreover, this Court has to take the caution note of the Supreme Court in the judgment reported in

2001-1-L.W. 429 = AIR 2000 SC 3032"". Even as against ex parte interim orders, the proper remedy is by way of filing appeals and not

challenging those orders by way of Article 227 of the Constitution of India. That apart, admittedly the petitioner has filed petitions under Order 7,

Rule 11 of C.P.C. for rejection of plaint and therefore all the contentions that are raised in this Civil Revision Petition are available for the petitioner

to canvass before the learned District Munsif. When such a petition is admittedly pending I do not want to decide the points raised by the

respective counsel for the petitioner and the respondents both on merits and on the jurisdiction of the trial Court to entertain the suit itself since such

a finding will have adverse effect on the submissions that are to be made before the trial Court in the applications filed by the petitioner herein to

reject the plaint. In that view of the matter, without expressing any opinion on the rival submissions made before me this Civil Revision Petition is

dismissed. However, the petitioner is given liberty to raise all the points in the application filed by the petitioner for rejection of plaint before the

learned District Munsif. Since ad-interim injunction has been granted on 5.1.2001 and the same has been extended by the learned District Munsif.

The learned District Munsif shall decide the interim application filed by the petitioner for rejection of plaint as expeditiously as possible in any case

within a period of one month from the date of receipt of a copy of this order. With the above observations this civil revision petition is dismissed.

No costs. Consequently C.M.P. No. 967 of 2001 is also dismissed.