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Civil Revision No.1962/D of 1984, decided on 15th December, 1984.

---S.115 & O.XLI, r.27(1)(a)--Punjab Pre-emption Act (I of 1913), S.15--Pre-emption suit--Appeal--Revision-Additional evidence, production of--Appropriate order to allow production of additional evidence, held, could be passed only before hearing of appeal.- [Evidence]. Raja Indrajit Pratap Bahadur Sahi v. Amar Singh and others AIR 1923 P C 128 and Messrs Muhammad Siddiq Muhammad Umar and another v. The Australasia Bank Ltd. P L D 1966 S C 684 ref.

---S. 15--Civil Procedure Code (V of 1908), S.115--Pre-emption suit- Appeal--Revision--Finding of appellate Court that pre-emptor was a collateral of vendor, a finding of fact--Such finding, held, sacrosanct for purpose of revision--No jurisdictional error of nature of misreading or non-reading of evidence on record pointed out--Revision against order of appellate Court decreeing suit dismissed. Prithi and others v. Mst. Kanta Devi A I R 1939 Lah. 309 rel.

---S.115--Punjab Pre-emption Act (I of 1913), S.15--Pre-emption suit--Appeal--Revision--Plea that petitioner vendor was a tenant of land in dispute but pre-emptor's claim decreed by appellate Court without regard to superiority of petitioner/ vendors' right as such, not raised either in written statement or before Courts below and not even in revision petition--No evidence either led to sustain this plea--Plea repelled in revision in circumstances. Ch.. Muhammad Ibrahim for Petitioners.

Sale of 3 Kanals 10 Marlas land made by one Sultan in favour of the petitioner was sued out to be pre-empted by the respondent claiming himself to be a collateral of the vendor. Copies of his pedigree table sought to be produced by the respondent in the course of his own examination as a witness were disallowed by the trial Judge who later dismissed his suit with the finding that the ground alleged to claim superiority of right of pre-emption had not been proved. In his appeal against the decree respondent filed an application under Order XLI, rule 27 , C . P. C . for the certified copies of pedigree-table existing on the trial Court's file being admitted in evidence. Learned Additional District Judge seized of the appeal came to the conclusion that the respondent's omission to have the documents made a part of his evidence at the appropriate stage was not mala fide but was the result of inadvertance because they had been relied upon right from the beginning and, upon realizing the mistake, he had even made an application in the trial Court to seek permission in that behalf. In his opinion it was in the interest of justice that the documents may have been admitted but were unjustifiably refused. Consequently, by his order dated 3-10-1984 learned Additional District Judge allowed the documents to form part of his evidence. The appeal itself was later heard and allowed on 30-10-1984 upon a finding reached on the basis of these copies, that the respondent was a collateral of the vendor. His suit was accordingly decree. The vendee has now come up to this Court in revision. 2. Learned counsel has contended that learned Additional District Judge has erred in the exercise of his jurisdiction in allowing the respondent's application by a separate order, without having heard the appeal at that stage. His argument is that it could only be upon hearing the appeal that he may have allowed the additional evidence to be taken. In the same strain he also submitted that, at any rate, the additional evidence did not deserve to be allowed because it tantamounted to allowing the respondents to fill in the lacunas of his evidence and patch up the weaknesses of his case. This contention is clearly misconceived in so far as the present case fell under clause (a) of sub-rule (1) of rule 27 of Order XLI of the C.P.C. and not under clause (b) thereof which deals with the cases where the appellate Court may require the production of certain evidence to enable it to pronounce judgment and hence the appropriate order to allow its production could properly be passed only before the hearing of the appeal. Second limb of his contention is equally without merit because learned Additional District Judge has found that the relevant copies were already present on the trial Court's file and had been relied upon right from the beginning but could not be tendered in evidence at the appropriate stage due to inadvertance and deserved, in the interest of justice, to be admitted by the trial Court before whom a request for the purpose was made immediately upon realization of the omission This approach of learned Additional District Judge is really unexceptionable because the relevant documents were the certified copies of public record. Undoubted authenticity and genuineness of documents formed one of the considera tions for the Lordships of the Privy Council in the case Raja Indrajit Pratap Bahadur Sahi v. Amar Singh and others A I R 1923 P C 128 to admit additional evidence with reference to clause (b) of rule 27 ibid with the observation that "Rules of procedure are not made for the purpose of hindering justice". This interpretation of the scope of rule 27 was approved by their Lordships of the Supreme Court in Messrs Muhammad Siddiq Muhammad Umar and another v. The Australasia Bank Ltd. P L D 1966 S C 686 wherein it was further observed that the Court should not give such a restricted interpretation to the provisions of rule 27 as would, in effect, amount to tying down the hands of the appellate Court and stand in the way of doing complete justice in a cause. Contention of the learned counsel is, therefore, repelled. 3. Learned counsel then argued that even after admittance of Additional evidence the pre-emptor/ respondent had not been proved to be a collateral of the vendor in so far as a copy of the pedigree-table produced by the petitioner did not connect the two. This argument is again misconceived for the reason that the petitioner's copy of the pedigree-table relates to the year 1979-80 and is hence incomplete while the copies produced by the respondent as Exh.P.2 to P.4 relate back to the year 1864-65 and give their complete pedigree. Learned Additional, District Judge has concluded upon their perusal that "plaintiff pre-emptor is a collateral of Sultan vendor". This finding, as held in Prithi and others v. Mst. Kanta Devi A I R 1939 Lah. 309 is a finding of fact and, no jurisdictional error of the nature of misreading or non-reading of evidence on the record having been pointed out, is sacrosanct for the purposes of this revision. 4. In the end learned counsel submitted that the petitioner is a tenant of the land in dispute but the respondent's claim has been decreed by the learned Additional District Judge without regard to the superiority of the petitioner's right as such. I find that this plea is altogether new and has never been raised before, neither in the written statement nor before the Courts below and not even in this petition fort revision. There is no evidence either led to sustain this plea and the same is, therefore, repelled. Upshot of the above discussion is that there is no merit in the revision petition. Hence dismissed in limine. M.Y.H. Revision dismissed.

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