SATYENDRA NATH BORAL AND ANJALI MULLICK v. MRITYUNJOY DEY
2003-06-16
A.N.RAY, JYOTESH BANERJEE
body2003
DigiLaw.ai
A. N. RAY, JYOTESH BANERJEE ( 1 ) THE Court: The appeal is treated as on the day's list and the stay application and the appeal are disposed of together. No affidavits are called for and as such the allegation in the petition cannot be taken to be admitted. ( 2 ) MR. Bose's client, the appellant, claiming himself to be an executor of a yet unprobated will of one of the deceased parties to a partition suit, made an application for being added as a party and one Hon'ble Judge of this Court allow that application. It was recorded that in spite of notice some of the respondents did not appear and contest the application for addition. ( 3 ) LATER on the said respondents made an application for recall of the order. It was an application in the nature of an application for recall of an ex parte order wherein the aggrieved party pleaded just cause for non-appearance. ( 4 ) THE said application for recall was allowed by a different Hon'ble Judge than the Judge who had passed the order initially. ( 5 ) IN support of the appeal Mr. Bose raised only this technical point that only the same Hon'ble Judge who had passed the initial order could have recalled it on grounds similar to those mentioned in Order 9 rule 13, since his Lordship was still attached to the Court and quite available for disposal of the recall application. ( 6 ) THE point, therefore, is whether one Hon'ble Judge has jurisdiction to recall another Judge's order, when the ground for recall is not in the nature of review or a re-hearing but of the nature contemplated under Order 9 rule 13. ( 7 ) IT was all along the usual practice and the practice is still current, that a recall application of the Order 9 rule 13 type is heard by the same Hon'ble Judge or Judges who passed the original order. ( 8 ) HOWEVER, that practice has not found its way into the express words of any section or Order or Rule of the Civil Procedure Code, nor into any of the Chapters and Rules on the Original Side or Appellate Side of our High Court.
( 8 ) HOWEVER, that practice has not found its way into the express words of any section or Order or Rule of the Civil Procedure Code, nor into any of the Chapters and Rules on the Original Side or Appellate Side of our High Court. ( 9 ) NO doubt the Original Side Rules contain a specific rule that a practice on the Original Side shall have the same force of law as that of an express rule contained in the Original Side Rule Book. ( 10 ) ON the other hand, the Civil Procedure Code shows that when the Legislature intends that a particular application should be heard, not merely by a Court (meaning thereby any sitting Judge of Judges of that Court), but by a particular Judge or some particular Judges of that Court then express provision in that regard is made in the Code. ( 11 ) SINCE Order 9 rule 13 mentions only the word "court", the jurisdiction to recall is thereby thus conferred on all the Hon'ble Judges provided of course good grounds for recall are made out. ( 12 ) IN view of the express provisions in review matters, and the absence of express provisions in the Civil Procedure Code in Order 9 rule 13 matters, the practice obtaining on the Original Side should not be accorded the force of an Original Side Rule, which would have the effect of nullifying contrary implication in the Orders of the Civil Procedure Code. ( 13 ) AS such, our opinion is that the practice requiring one Hon'ble Judge to recall his Lordship's earlier orders on Order 9 Rule 13 grounds, are similarly requiring other Hon'ble Judges to abstain from entertaining such applications, is at best a rule of judicial etiquette or usual judicial practice, which has not become a rule of laws, on the Original Side of this Court. ( 14 ) AS such, the recall order was made with jurisdiction. The appeal and the applications are, therefore, dismissed without any order as to costs. Authenticated copy of the Dictated Order may issue, on the usual undertaking. Appeal dismissed.