Five Judges Constitution Bench of this Court in the case
of Sardar Amarjit Singh Kalra vs. Pramod Gupta, AIR
2003 SC 2588, was considering the question as to the effect of
death of some of the appellants during the pendency of appeal.
In that case, during the pendency of appeal, some of the
appellants died on different dates and there was no attempt to
take any step within time for bringing to the Court the legal
representatives of the deceased appellants. The respondents,
therefore, filed application praying for dismissal of those
appeals as having been abated. It appears that during the
pendency of appeal in the High Court, some of the appellants
were said to have died, the plea of partial abatement of the
appeals qua only those deceased appellants were not accepted
by the High Court on the view that decree was joint based on
common right and interest, the appeal was rejected in toto.
On these facts, the Constitution Bench after discussing all
earlier decisions held as under:-
“27. Laws of procedure are meant to regulate effectively,
assist and aid the object of doing substantial and real
justice and not to foreclose even an adjudication on merits
of substantial rights of citizen under personal, property and
other laws. Procedure has always been viewed as the
handmaid of justice and not meant to hamper the cause of
justice or sanctify miscarriage of justice. A careful reading of
the provisions contained in Order 22 CPC as well as the
subsequent amendments thereto would lend credit and
support to the view that they were devised to ensure their
continuation and culmination in an effective adjudication
and not to retard the further progress of the proceedings
and thereby non-suit the others similarly placed as long as
their distinct and independent rights to property or any
claim remain intact and not lost forever due to the death of
one or the other in the proceedings. The provisions
contained in Order 22 are not to be construed as a rigid
matter of principle but must ever be viewed as a flexible tool
of convenience in the administration of justice.”
xxxxx
32. But, in our view also, as to what those circumstances
are to be, cannot be exhaustively enumerated and no hardand-fast
rule for invariable application can be devised. With
the march and progress of law, the new horizons explored
and modalities discerned and the fact that the procedural
laws must be liberally construed to really serve as
handmaid, make it workable and advance the ends of
justice, technical objections which tend to be stumbling
blocks to defeat and deny substantial and effective justice
should be strictly viewed for being discouraged, except
where the mandate of law inevitably necessitates it.
Consequently, having regard to the nature of the
proceedings under the Act and the purpose of reference
proceedings and the appeal therefrom, the courts should
adopt a liberal approach in the matter of condonation of the
delay as well as the considerations which should weigh in
adjudging the nature of the decree i.e. whether it is joint
and inseverable or joint and severable or separable. The fact
that the Reference Court has chosen to pass a decree jointly
in the matters before us is and should be no ground by
itself to construe the decree to be joint and inseparable. At
times, as in the cases on hand, the court for its convenience
might have combined the claims for joint consideration on
account of similar nature of the issues in all such cases and
for that reason the parties should not be penalized, for no
fault of theirs. Actus curiae neminem gravabit (an act of
court shall prejudice no one) is the maxim of law, which
comes into play in such situations. A number of people,
more for the sake of convenience, may be counselled to join
together to ventilate, all their separate but similar nature of
claims and this also should not result in the claims of all
such others being rejected merely because one or the other
of such claims by one or more of the parties abated on
account of death and consequent omission to bring on
record the legal heirs of the deceased party. At times, one or
the other parties on either side in a litigation involving
several claims or more than one, pertaining to their
individual rights may settle among themselves the dispute
to the extent their share or proportion of rights is concerned
and may drop out of contest, bringing even the proceedings
to a conclusion so far as they are concerned. If all such
moves are allowed to boomerang adversely on the rights of
the remaining parties even to contest and have their claims
adjudicated on merits, it would be a travesty of
administration of justice itself.
35. In the light of the above discussion, we hold:
(1) Wherever the plaintiffs or appellants or petitioners
are found to have distinct, separate and independent
rights of their own and for the purpose of convenience
or otherwise, joined together in a single litigation to
vindicate their rights, the decree passed by the court
thereon is to be viewed in substance as the
combination of several decrees in favour of one or the
other parties and not as a joint and inseverable
decree. The same would be the position in the case of
defendants or respondents having similar rights
contesting the claims against them.
(2) Whenever different and distinct claims of more
than one are sought to be vindicated in one single
proceedings, as the one now before us, under the
Land Acquisition Act or in similar nature of
proceedings and/or claims in assertion of individual
rights of parties are clubbed, consolidated and dealt
with together by the courts concerned and a single
judgment or decree has been passed, it should be
treated as a mere combination of several decrees in
favour of or against one or more of the parties and not
as joint and inseparable decrees.
(3) The mere fact that the claims or rights asserted or
sought to be vindicated by more than one are similar
or identical in nature or by joining together of more
than one of such claimants of a particular nature, by
itself would not be sufficient in law to treat them as
joint claims, so as to render the judgment or decree
passed thereon a joint and inseverable one.
(4) The question as to whether in a given case the
decree is joint and inseverable or joint and severable
or separable has to be decided, for the purposes of
abatement or dismissal of the entire appeal as not
being properly and duly constituted or rendered
incompetent for being further proceeded with,
requires to be determined only with reference to the
fact as to whether the judgment/decree passed in the
proceedings vis-à-vis the remaining parties would
suffer the vice of contradictory or inconsistent
decrees. For that reason, a decree can be said to be
contradictory or inconsistent with another decree
only when the two decrees are incapable of
enforcement or would be mutually self-destructive
and that the enforcement of one would negate or
render impossible the enforcement of the other.
REPORTABLE
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CIVIL APPEAL No.2963 OF 2013
Government of Andhra Pradesh Vs Pratap Karan
Citation;(2016)2 SCC82: AIR 2016 SC 1717
M. Y. EQBAL, J.
