In Re: Kollipara Venkamma

The petitioner who was plaintiff before the District Munsif''s Court could have appealed to the District Court against the Munsif''s decision, if she

considered that decision was legally wrong. If she had done so, and if she failed even in appeal, she could have come up in second appeal to this

Court, in a suit relating to a claim for maintenance.

Instead of doing so, she has put in this revision petition u/s 115 of the Civil Procedure Code, 225 days after District Munsif''s decision. This is

not a case in which ""No appeal lies"" to the High Court and hence Section 115 cannot apply. There is no question of jurisdiction, perversely illegal

decision, or material irregularity of procedure involved but only a question whether the District Munsif committed an error of law in allowing the

plaintiff''s Vakil''s consent to bind the plaintiff in the decision of the suit. It is admitted that the Vakil''s vakalat empowered him to compromise the

suit but the contention is that without a special and separate vakalat (other than the engagement vakalat which empowered the Vakil to

compromise), the Vakil''s consent to the rate of maintenance proposed by the other side is not binding on the plaintiff.

I see no reason to hold that a Vakil who has got a vakalat empowering him to compromise an action should get a second vakalat which contains

the same power simply because the first vikalat empowers him to do other things also besides empowering him to compromise. A Vakil in the

Indian Courts is both the Solicitor who acts and a Counsel who pleads for his client. In Matheus v. Munster 57 L.J.Q.B. 49 it was held that, where

the defendant''s Counsel, in the absence of the defendant and without his express authority, assented to a verdict for the plaintiff for �350 with

costs and withdrew all imputations against the plaintiff, the settlement was a matter which was within the apparent general authority of Counsel and

was binding on the defendant. In Butler v. Knight 36 L.J. Ex. 66 it was held that, even when the client had expressly prohibited her Solicitor to

accept any compromise, and even though she had obtained judgment and decree, she was bound by the act of her Solicitor in accepting a

compromise so far as the other party was concerned, if that other party had no notice of any limitation having been imposed on her Solicitor''s

authority and that her only remedy lay in an action for negligence against her Solicitor. In the present case, the Vakil had express authority to

compromise the suit. I think that serious inconvenience would result to the administration of justice by Courts if, even after a Vakil has been given

power to compromise the suit by the plaintiff who engages him and after the opposite party, on the faith of that vakalat, has offered terms of

compromise which were accepted and acted upon, and after the Court has, on the faith of the assurance of the legal practitioners, passed its

decision by their consent, the plaintiff should be allowed to take the objection that she did not give a special second vakalat mentioning only the

power to compromise. There is no allegation even in the revision petition that she had prohibited the Vakil to compromise the suit notwithstanding

that the vakalat to act gave him such power and that the defendant knew that her Vakil had no such power (that the vakalat gave him such power

is spoken to by her Vakil who was examined in the review petition case. See Mr. Gomoji Row''s order on the Review Petition.)

The Privy Council held, in Rajunder Narain Rae v. Bijai Gobind Singh 2 M.I.A. 253 that when a Vakil admitted that the rental of a zemindari in

dispute was a certain sum, the admission was binding on his client. Jagapati Mudaliar v. Ekambara Mudaliar 21 M.k 274 was a case in which the

vakalat did not give power to the Vakil to compromise the suit. That there is no distinction between Vakils and Counsel in these matters is clear

from Venkata Narasimha Naidu v. Bhashyakarlu Naidu 22 M.k 538.

This petition in revision put in by the plaintiff is, therefore, rejected.