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Pandit Shyam Lal vs Badri And Anr.

High Court Of Judicature at Allahabad|22 June, 1923

JUDGMENT / ORDER

JUDGMENT Kanhaiya Lal, J.
1. This appeal arises out of a suit for the redemption of a mortgage effected by the plaintiffs, Badri and Kidar, in favour of the defendant on the 23rd of December 1915. The mortgage was effected for a sum of Rs. 135, which was re-payable with interest at 2 per cent, per mensem compound able with monthly rests. The plaintiffs pleaded that they never agreed to pay interest at 2 per cent. per mensem with monthly rest, and that the above term was entered in the bond without their knowledge. They further pleaded that the interest claimed was, in any case, hard and unconscionable. The Trial Court found that there was no proof of undue influence exercised by the creditor and that the terms entered in the bonds were binding on the plaintiffs. It decreed the entire claim of the plaintiffs accordingly. The lower Appellate Court, however, refused to allow interest at the stipulated rate with monthly rests. It observed that the plaintiffs were illiterate persons and ignorant of the technicalities of law or legal expression, and that they could not be expected to have fully realised the stipulation entered in the mortgage in regard to the payment of compound interest with monthly rests. The stipulation undoubtedly unusual, hard and unconscionable; and probably had its effect been fully realised by the plaintiffs at the time the mortgage-deed was written they would not have agreed to the transaction. It can not be said that the debtor entered into it with, open eyes, for the lower Appellate Court finds, that he was, by reason of his illiteracy and ignorance of legal technicalities, unable to realised the effect of the same. A Court of Equity may, therefore, relieve him and grant such relief as the circumstances of the case may require. The decision in Ghansham Singh v. Bhola Singh 74 Ind. Cas. 411 : 21 A.L.J. 465 at p. 470 : (1923) A.I.R. (A.) 490 : 45 A. 506 (F.B.) does not apply, because the question here is whether the executants understood and realised the effect of the terms entered in the mortgage-deed, the finding on which is against the plaintiffs. The appeal, therefore, fails and is dismissed with costs.
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Title

Pandit Shyam Lal vs Badri And Anr.

Court

High Court Of Judicature at Allahabad

JudgmentDate
22 June, 1923
Judges
  • K Lal