Jai Jai Ram Manohar Lal v. National Bldg. Material Supply [1969 SC] | Current Affairs & General Knowledge - CLAT PDF Download

In Amulakchand Mewaram v. Babulal Kanalal [AIR 1933 Bom. 304], Beaumont, C.J., in delivering the judgment of the Bombay High Court set out the principles applicable to cases like the present and observed:

[T]he question whether there should be an amendment or not really turns upon whether the name in which the suit is brought is the name of a non-existent person or whether it is merely a misdescription of existing persons. If the former is the case, the suit is a nullity and no amendment can cure it. If the latter is the case, prima facie, there ought to be an amendment because the general rule, subject no doubt to certain exceptions, is that the Court should always allow an amendment where any loss to the opposing party can be compensated for by costs.

This Court considered a somewhat similar case in Purushottam Unedbhai case. A firm carrying onbusiness outside India filed a suit in the firm name in the High Court of Calcutta for a decree for compensation for breach of contract. The plaintiff then applied for amendment of the plaint by describing the names of all the partners and striking out the name of the firm as a mere misdescription.

This Court observed:

Since, however, a firm is not a legal entity the privilege of suing in the name of a firm is permissible only to those persons who, as partners, are doing business in India. Such privilege is not extended to persons who are doing business as partners outside India. In their case they still have to sue in their individual names. If however, under some misapprehension, persons doing business as partners outside India do file a plaint in the name of their firm they are misdescribing themselves, as the suit instituted is by them, they being known collectively as a firm. It seems, therefore, that a plaint filed in a Court in India in the name of firm doing business outside India is not by itself a nullity. It is a plaint by all the partners of the firm with a defective description of themselves for the purpose of the Code of Civil Procedure. In these circumstances, a Civil Court could permit, under the provisions of Section 153 (or possibly under Order VI, Rule 17, about which we say nothing), an amendment of the plaint to enable a proper description of the plaintiffs to appear in it in order to assist the Court in determining the real question or issue between the parties.

These cases do no more than illustrate the well-settled rule that all amendments should be permitted as may be necessary for the purpose of determining the real question in controversy between the parties, unless by permitting the amendment injustice may result to the other side.

In the present case, the plaintiff was carrying on business as commission agent in the name of “Jai Jai Ram Manohar Lal.” The plaintiff was competent to sue in his own name as Manager of the Hindu undivided family to which the business beLonged; he says he sued on behalf of the family in the business name. The observations made by the High Court that the application for amendment of the plaint could not be granted because there was no averment therein that the misdescription was on account of a bona fide mistake, and on that account the suit must fail, cannot be accepted. In our view, there is no rule that unless in an application for amendment of the plaint it is expressly averred that the error, omission or misdescription is due to a bona fide mistake, the Court has no power to grant leave to amend the plaint. The power to grant amendment of the pleadings is intended to serve the ends of justice and is not governed by any such narrow or technical limitations.

Since the name in which the action was instituted was merely a misdescription of the original plaintiff, no question of limitation arises; the plaint must be deemed to have been instituted in the name of the real plaintiff on the date on which it was originally instituted.

The appeal is allowed and the decree passed by the High Court is set aside. The proceedings will stand remanded to the High Court for disposal according to law on the merits of the dispute between the parties.

There is consistent and reliable evidence establishing that all the accused had attacked the house of the informan