Katikara Simhagiri Dora alias Latchanna Dora and Others vs Sri Vyricherla Chandramani Pattamahadevi, Zamindarini of Chemudu

Horwill, J.—On an application by the sixth defendant the lower Court amended what is often described as the decretal part of the judgment

to bring it into conformity with the earlier parts of the judgment. He thereupon amended the decree to bring it into conformity with the amended

judgment. Against that order, this revision petition has been filed u/s 115, Civil Procedure Code; and a preliminary point has been taken that no

Civil Revision Petition lies.

One of the earliest cases in which the question whether a revision petition lay against such an amendment, or an appeal, was considered was

Raghunath Das v. Raj Kumar ILR (1884) All. 276, which was followed by the same two Judges in Surta v. Ganga ILR (1885) All. 411.-Oldfield,

J., held that since the decree was amended, an appeal would lie against the amended decree. Mahmood, J., in a long discussion of the various

aspects; of the case, did not directly say that no appeal would lie against the amended decree, but discussed whether the amending order would

amount to a decree and he held that it would not. He then went on to express his opinion that a revision did lie. The matter was again considered in

Letters Patent Appeal by a Full Bench in Raghunath Das v. Raj Kumar (1884) 7 All. 876 in which, in a single sentence judgment, the view of

Mahmood, J., was accepted. A similar question arose in Narayanaswami. v. Natesan ILR (1892) Mad. 424, where Best, J., referred to the

Allahabad cases and said, with regard to the objection that no revision petition lay:

... it is contended that, though an order passed u/s 206 (Section 152 of the present Code) is not appealable as an order u/s 588 (Section 104), the

decree as amended, is appealable. This was the opinion of Oldfield, J., in Surta v. Ganga ILR (1885) All. 411, but Mahmood, J., was of different

opinion in the same case, and on appeal the Full Bench agreed with the latter, Surta v. Ganga ILR (1884) All. 875, and this view appears to have

been adopted by this Court also. This first objection must, therefore be disallowed.

Muttuswami Aiyar, J., the other Judge in that Bench, did not duscuss this question at all, and gave a reluctant assent to the order proposed by his

learned brother Best, J. It may however be taken, from the fact that he agreed to the order passed, that he was of opinion that a revision petition

lay. Since Mahmood, J., did not expressly say that an appeal against the amended decree would not lie, nor did the Full Bench, and Best J.''s

opinion was apparently not concurred in by Muttuswami Aiyar, J., the argument was put forward in Viswanathan Chettiar v. Ramanathan Chetty

ILR (1901) Mad. 646 that an appeal against the amended decree did lie. That view was accepted by the Bench in these words:

Mr. Justice Mahmood in discussing the question in Nanda Rai v. Raghunandan Singh (1884) 7 All. 282, overlooks the possibility of an appeal

against the decree as amended, and for that reason comes to the conclusion that Section 622 of the CPC must be applied. It must be admitted that

Mr. Justice Mahmood''s view has been followed in one or two cases in this Court, but no reported case is cited in which a Bench of Judges has

held that an appeal against the amended decree will not lie.

Earlier in the judgment, the learned Judges said that a petition u/s 622 (Section 115) was not admissible. The learned Judges in Viswanathan

Chetty v. Ramanathan Chetty ILR (1901) Mad. 646 did not consider that there was anything in Narayanaswami v. Natesan ILR (1892) Mad.

424, or in any other case that it was necessary for them to express dissent from. Wadsworth and Patanjali Sastri, JJ., in PS. AR. AR.

Arunachalam Chettiar by agent, Sivaraman Chettiar Vs. Govindaswami Goundan, and Garimalla Sitaramamurti Vs. Thamma

Lakshminarayanamurti and Others, , clearly followed Viswanathan Chetty v. Ramanathan Chetty ILR (1901) Mad. 646. It has been argued that in

Parameshraya v. Seshagiriappa ILR (1899) Mad. 364 a Full Bench, in similar circumstances, held that a revision petition would lie, or at any rate

that the Court could interfere in revision. That was a case in which there was an appeal against the amended decree; and in dismissing the appeal,

the Court deleted that part of the decree which had been amended. There is no reason, however, to think that in doing so, the Court invoked

Section 115, CPC for that purpose; for in exercising their jurisdiction in appeal, they certainly had the power to amend the decree in any way they

chose.

The preliminary objection is upheld. It has been suggested that this civil revision petition should be converted into a regular appeal. That can

hardly be done, since the decree appealed against has not been filed.

Since Section 115 refers to a ''case'' that word may include the order to amend together with the amended decree, in which case interference in

revision would be prohibited under that section; but even if we distinguish the order to amend and the amended decree, the entertainment of a Civil

Revision Petition would be objectionable, when an alternative remedy is available.

The preliminary objection being upheld, the Civil Revision Petition is dismissed with costs.