M.R. Srinivasa Row vs Pichai Pillai

Miller, J.—In this case the District Munsif has made an order prohibiting a second grade pleader from appearing for the plaintiffs in O.S.

No. 32 of 1913 on his file.

The pleader had appeared and acted in a proceeding in the Magistrate''s Court u/s 145 Cr. P.C. and had there obtained an order for his client

maintaining his possession until he should be disturbed by a Civil Court. O.S. No. 32 of 1913 was instituted nearly three years after the date of this

order, by the unsuccessful party in the Magisterial proceedings, and the pleader filed the plaint on their behalf and appeared for the purpose of

conducting the case but on the defendant''s (his former client''s) objection has been prohibited from doing so.

The District Munsif relies on Rule 277 of the Civil Rules of Practice as justifying his order, and in my opinion, he is, in substance, right. Mr.

Ramachandra Aiyar contends that this rule being in the Civil Rules of Practice has no application when one of the proceedings in question is a

proceeding in a Magistrate''s Court. These rules of practice, as is seen by their preamble, are to be applied only in Civil Courts, but here the matter

which gives rise to the question is O.S. No. 32 of 1913 a proceeding in a Civil Court, and I am not inclined to restrict the word '' proceeding '' in

the earlier part of the rule to proceedings in a Civil Court when neither the language of the rule nor the preamble requires that limitation. It was

further contended that the suit is not a '' matter connected with the proceeding"" before the Magistrate. I have had some doubt on this point, but I

agree with Mr Venkatrama Sastri''s argument that the rule is not to be given too narrow a scope, and should be interpreted as liberally as its

language will allow and I do not think it is very difficult to hold that O.S. No. 32 of 1913 is a matter which, to use the words of Hall V. C in Little

v. Kingswood Collieries Company (1882) 20 Gh. D 733 ""flows out of the former proceedings"" and ""may be considered as something in the nature

of a continuance of, or supplemental to "" that proceeding. No doubt the title and not the possession is to be decided in the suit, but that does not

affect the present question, for the mere fact that the questions to be decided are different will not necessarily involve the conclusion that the two

proceedings are unconnected. The suit is that which was indicated in the Magistrate''s order and so flows out of it, it was necessitated by that

order, and it relates to the property with which that order was concerned and it is between the parties to that order.

In spite therefore of the lapse of three years between the one proceeding and the other, I am of opinion that the later is a matter connected with

the earlier.

It was suggested at the end of his argument, though not taken as a ground in his petition, by Mr. Ramachandra Aiyar that Rule 277 is ultra vires

of the High Court, in the sense that it is not founded on any section of the Legal Practitioners Act which gives power to make it. It may be that this

is so, but I do not think it necessary to search the statutes for enabling powers in this case. I may take it for my present purpose that the rule merely

defines the view of the High Court as to what will amount to a sufficient reason for punishing a pleader in the particular matter, that if a practitioner

does not infringe the rule he will not lay himself open to punishment or reprimand, even though he may not attain to that standard of fidelity which

may seem desirable in persons professing to deserve the degree of confidence which must of necessity be placed in a leg it practitioner by his

client. Of course if a pleader be found as a matter of fact to have disclosed to one client secrets confided to him in his capacity of legal adviser by

another, that would give rise to different considerations which would not depend on the existence of a rule like Rule 277 of the Civil Rules of

Practice. Whether the two clients were ranged as opponents or not, such conduct would necessarily be grossly improper. Taking this view of the

rule, I have to consider the further objection that the District Munsif had no jurisdiction to make the order. The rule however clearly empowers the

Court, i.e., the Court in which the '' connected matter '' is under consideration to authorise or refuse to authorize the pleader to act, and I take the

Munsif''s order simply to amount to a refusal to give the necessary authority. If in spite of the refusal the pleader were to continue to act it might be

necessary to consider in what manner the District Munsif''s authority is to be vindicated but it is not necessary to go into that question here. I do not

sup-pose that any rule is necessary to enable a District Munsif, subject to correction by this Court, to refuse audience to ''a pleader in a case in

which that pleader by his very appearance is guilty of what will be viewed as professional misconduct, and that is all, as I understand the matter,

that has been really done by the District Munsif here, though the District Munsif does not take exactly that view of it.

6.Then remains the question whether the District Munsif ought to have authorised the pleader to act for the plaintiffs in O.S. No. 32 of 1913.

Considering that a large number of documents of title were produced in the proceedings in the Magistrate''s Court, it seems to me that it lay on

the pleader to satisfy the District Munsif that in acting in that proceeding he did not as a fact obtain from his then client any knowledge which would

be of use to his present clients, or that, if he did obtain any such knowledge then, such knowledge is now, so to speak, public property available to

any pleader who can obtain inspection of the record of the proceediug in the Magistrate''s Court. The pleader did not satisfy the District Munsif on

these points, and Mr. Ramachandra Aiyar did not satisfy me on them. As then in my opinion, the pleader has brought himself within the rule, I

cannot say that the District Munsif has wrongly exercised his discretion in refusing him audience.

In declining to interfere on behalf of the pleader, I think I ought to observe that the District Munsif is probably right in holding that he is not guilty

of misconduct involving any moral turpitude. It is not shewn, that is to say, nor do I see any reason to suspect, that he accepted the plaintiff''s

vakalat in order to make use of knowledge formerly derived from the defendant nor with any idea of making use of such knowledge. But the

District Munsif is right in saying that he ought to have offered his services to the defendant before acting for the plaintiffs, and if it be objected that

an unscrupulous defendant might easily in the circumstances have undertaken to employ him and then have refused after the plaintiffs had engaged

someone else, one answer seems to be that the practitioners must, even at some risk or sacrifice, refrain from taking up positions calculated to

impair the confidence reposed in them by their clients on grounds of policy if on no other ground this suggests itself as the better course.

The District Munsif made the pleader pay the costs of the argument before him, and I think he was right. In this Court too, as the pleader has

persisted in his contention that the rule does not apply to him and so has necessitated argument in this case, he must pay the costs of the

respondent.