Civil Revision No. 5558 of 2009 -1- *** IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Revision No. 5558 of 2009 Date of decision : 26.2.2010 Ram Lal ....Petitioner Versus Dilbar Singh Respondent CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE S. D. ANAND Present: Mr. Vivek Suri, Advocate for the petitioner Mr. Chaman Lal, Advocate for the respondent. S. D. ANAND, J. There was a valid decree for recovery of money granted by the competent Court in favour of the respondent-plaintiff and against the defendant-petitioner. An appeal filed by defendant- petitioner against the judgment and decree came to be dismissed in default. The defendant-petitioner filed a plea for restoration of the appeal. During the pendency thereof, the defendant-petitioner withdrew the appeal on a presentation before the Court that the dispute between the parties had been settled amicably and the respondent-plaintiff had received a sum of Rs.60,000/- in full and final settlement of the claim and also executed a receipt in token thereof. The plaintiff-respondent was not represented before the learned Appellate Court at that point of time. In the course of the execution proceedings, filed by the plaintiff-respondent for recovery Civil Revision No. 5558 of 2009 -2- *** of money in execution of judgment and decree in his favour, the defendant-petitioner raised a plea of satisfaction of claim. That plea was resisted by the plaintiff-respondent by offering a plain denial of averment made by the former in the context. Learned Executing Court negatived the plea filed by the defendant-petitioner by noticing that the averred compromise documentation did not even purport to bear the signatures of either the plaintiff-respondent or the learned counsel representing him. It was further noticed that the withdrawal had been applied for and came about on an averment of satisfaction of claim in the absence of a presentation on behalf of the plaintiff-respondent. Learned counsel appearing on behalf of defendant- petitioner states that the impugned finding deserves invalidation for the simple reason that the plaintiff-respondent received a sum of Rs.60,000/- from him in lump-sum in full and final satisfaction of the claim. The averred satisfaction of the claim was never certified to the learned Appellate court in the presence of plaintiff-respondent or his learned counsel. The withdrawal documentation does not purport to bear either the signature of the plaintiff-respondent or the learned counsel represented him. In the course of evidence recorded in the context of the averment aforementioned, the defendant-petitioner had raised a plea that he paid up the amount of Rs.60000/- to the plaintiff-respondent by raising a loan of that amount from Sat Pal Narain Dass. The learned Trial Court very Civil Revision No. 5558 of 2009 -3- *** correctly noticed that the plea could not be accepted as Sat Pal Narain Dass aforementioned had not been examined by the defendant-petitioner. The learned Executing Court further noticed that it was fairly unnatural to accept that the decree holder also was entitled to the recovery of a sum of Rs.1,54,177/-, would accept a sum of Rs.60,000/- in full and final settlement of the claim, particularly when he was contesting the plea for restoration of the appeal which had been dismissed in default. In terms of the provisions of the Civil Procedure Code, a compromise has to be notified by both the parties thereto to the Court which (Court) were certify it by acting upon it. A compromise could be notified to the Court even in the absence of the party opposite but if it runs to the detriment of the party averring it or, in any case, does not work to the detriment of the absentee party. A situation can be conveniently conceived where there is a decree against a defendant. If the latter ( i.e. defendant) filed an appeal against the judgment and decree, he may opt to withdraw it and allow the judgment and decree appealed against to attain finality qua himself. If, however, any part of the compromise is to the disadvantage of the absentee party, the (exparte) notification of the compromise to the Court would not be acceptable in law. These observations are applicable to the present case with extra vigour because the appeal filed by the defendant petitioner had been dismissed in default and the petitioner- respondent had not yet entered appearance in the proceedings Civil Revision No. 5558 of 2009 -4- *** launched by the former for restoration thereof. I have not been able to persuade myself to find any fault with the impugned order. The petition is held to be without any force and is ordered to be dismissed. February 26, 2010 (S. D. ANAND) Pka JUDGE