Sheo Charan Singh vs Kishno Kuer and Another

Bucknill, J.—This an application in Civil Revisional Jurisdiction made to this Court under somewhat curious circumstances.

The applicant obtained a decree for rent against the opposite party here in the Court of the Munsif of the 1st Court of Gaya. Having obtained his decree he then applied for execution. It would seem that there were four properties which were put up for sale and the Court allowed the decree-holder (that is the applicant here) to bid for the properties as the sale. There seems no doubt that the valuation which was put on the properties was that the first was put at Rs. 46, the second at Rs. 1,470, the third at Rs. 3,075 and the fourth at Rs. 55. There is nothing on the record or before me to indicate in any way that the sale proclamations were not duly published and in fact on the 21st January last the sale was proceeded with. It would appear from the record that there were other bidders besides the decree-holder. Now the Munsif made a curious order on the 22nd of January, that is to say, the day after the sale. He placed in his order-sheet the following words:

Decree-holder did not bid for the valuation fixed by the Court. The case is dismissed, vide order passed on the sale proclamation.

When we turned to the sale proclamation we saw that the note or order there reads:

The decree-holder does not wish to bid up to the value fixed by the Court. The property on sale is 28 45 acres Nakli Bhaoli and Belagan lands. The decree is for Rs. 566-9. He wants to purchase the property for a nominal value. This cannot be allowed, as the decree-holder did not care to bid for more; so I dismiss the case.

Now it is very difficult to see how ON the language of these two orders it was really altogether open to the Munsif to adopt the course which he did. I do not know that there is any legal necessity for a bidder at an auction-sale, whether he be a decree-holder at whose instance the property being sold is being put up for sale or whether he be an outside person, to purchase the property at the full price at which it may have been valued in the sale proclamation. On the contrary it would seem that after all the value of the property which is thus put up to auction is really only that which it will actually fetch at that auction assuming of course that there is no fraud or malpractice with regard to the bidders and that the sale has been reasonably and properly made public. I have no doubt that there is a good deal of force in what is urged by the learned vakil who appeared for the opposite party, namely that owing to there being a number of sales conducted on the same day it was not very feasible for the Munsif to have recorded at great length his reasons for his order in the order-sheet. There is nothing except the suggestion contained in the order which is endorsed on the sale proclamation where the Munsif says that the decree-holder wants to purchase the property for a nominal value which leads one to suppose that there was anything improper or wrong in the way in which the sale had been made public or in the way in which the bids took place. On the other hand, there is certainly this to be said in favour of the Munsif''s view, namely, that so far as the second property was concerned the amount which was in fact bid was a very trifling one compared with the value which was put upon the property in itself. In that instance it will be observed that whilst the value was Rs. 1,470 the price bid was Rs. 232 As regards the third property put up for sale the difference was very much worse; for there, whilst the value was Rs. 3,075, the bid for it was Rs. 231. What I think the Munsif should have done was to have expressed his views as to the unsatisfactory nature of the sale in clearer terms and to have given his reasons which ought to be substantial ones for declining to proceed with the sale. I do not think that the reasons which he was given are good reasons for dismissing the execution case; for so far as we can see, the decree-holder had done nothing really wrong in refusing to bid up to the total value which had been fixed on the property. I think the Munsif''s order should have been, after having set out his reasons, to have ordered that there should be an issue of a fresh sale proclamation under circumstances of proper publicity which would ensure that at the next auction when the property should be put up for sale there should be suitable bidders. Under such conditions no doubt the properties would fetch whatever they were really worth and what the public was ready to pay for them. It may be said with regard to the first and fourth properties that the prices which were offered were substantially equivalent to the prices at which the two properties were valued and that is certainly so. At the same time these two properties are of very little account aggregating just Rs. 101 in value. It does not therefore seem desirable to split these two properties away from the other two or to regard the two properties entirely separately.

I should mention that after the decision by the Munsif it would seem that the decree-holder preferred some sort of appeal to the District Judge of Gaya. What exactly happened before the District Judge it is difficult to understand. Prom the order-sheet of the 5th February there seems to be a note by the serishtadar saying that the order complained of is not appealable (vide Order 43, Rule 1 and Section 104, Civil P. C). On the same day the District Judge minutes: "Put up in presence of pleader." No date is mentioned as to when it should be put. But on the 16th February we got an order of the District Judge: "Pleader absent. File." Whether this is tantamount to the dismissal of the appeal or whether that is tantamount to the adjournment of it I do not know. However to my mind the conclusion is after all the same, for although the matter has coma up to this Court by way of complaint against what appears to have been the serishtadar''s order of the 5th February, there is also a complaint quite clearly made that the order which the Munsif passed on the 22nd January was illegal. I have no hesitation in coming to the conclusion that the order which was passed by the Munsif on the 22nd January is an unsatisfactory one.

It must be set aside and the Munsif ordered to reinstate the execution cases, to direct that a new sale proclamation shall be issued and that such precautions should be taken with regard to the publicity of the conditions under which the sale will be hold so as to ensure that a reasonable and proper sale will be held upon the date fixed. There will be no order for costs in this application.