Civil Revision No.6778 of 2011 1 .. IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Revision No. 6778 of 2011 (O&M) Date of Decision: November 7th, 2011 Amrik Singh .... Petitioner Versus Purshotam Lal and others .... Respondents CORAM : HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE VIJENDER SINGH MALIK Present Mr. R.S.Bhatia, Advocate, for the petitioner. VIJENDER SINGH MALIK, J. Purshotam Lal, the plaintiff, filed a suit under the provisions of section 6 of the Special Relief Act, 1963 for mandatory injunction directing the defendants to hand over possession of the premises in question to him. On notice, the defendants appeared and filed written statement as well as application under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC. For the simple reason that the application under Order 7 rule 11 CPC had been moved alongwith the written statement, learned Civil Judge (Junior Division), Ludhiana has held that the application under Order 7 Rule 11 need not be considered and consequently, dismissed the same. Aggrieved by this order, the defendant Amrik Singh has brought this revision petition under the provisions of Article 227 of the Constitution of India. I have heard Mr. R.S.Bhatia, learned counsel for the petitioner and have gone through the record carefully. Civil Revision No.6778 of 2011 2 .. Learned counsel for the petitioner has submitted that it is no where mentioned in the C.P.C. that an application under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC cannot be filed simultaneously with the written statement or even after filing of the written statement. He has submitted that learned trial court did not consider the application on merits and has dismissed the same only for the reason that written statement has also been filed and defence of the defendants has come on record. Learned counsel for the petitioner has cited before me a decision of a coordinate bench of this Court in Class India Ltd. and Anr. Vs. A.K.Chopra and Ors. AIR 2008 P&h 116, where the same question was considered and it has been held that the application under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC does not merit rejection for the only reason that it has not been filed at a particular stage. The application under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC is brought with a view to get the plaint rejected on various grounds. It is undisputedly true that such a step should be taken before any meaningful proceeding has been conducted in the case. In the latter event, the proceedings conducted in the case would amount to wastage of time of the court, if the application under Order 7 Rule 11 was accepted. Therefore, the same should be filed as expeditiously as possible. However, no specific stage has been given in the CPC for filing this application. Moreover, Order 7 Rule 11 CPC does not lay down that this application has to be filed before filing of the written statement. The written statement moreover was filed simultaneously with the application and the application could not be dismissed for the only reason that written statement has come on the record. Civil Revision No.6778 of 2011 3 .. In these circumstances, the approach of learned trial court in the matter of dealing with the application in hand cannot be said to be legal. The revision petition is, therefore, allowed and the impugned order is set aside directing learned trial court to decide the application on merits. (VIJENDER SINGH MALIK) JUDGE November 7th, 2011 som