IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD TUESDAY, THE FIRST DAY OF NOVEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND ELEVEN HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE G. BHAVANI PRASAD Civil Revision Petition Nos.2665, 2691, 2835, 2842, 2908, 2911, 2958, 4267 of 2011 C.R.P.No.2665 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy .. Petitioner AND C. Srinivasa Reddy .. Respondent C.R.P.No.2691 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy .. Petitioner AND M. Srinivasulu .. Respondent C.R.P.No.2835 of 2011 Between: A. Balreddy .. Petitioner AND N. Pullaiah .. Respondent C.R.P.No.2842 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy .. Petitioner AND M. Srinivasulu .. Respondent C.R.P.No.2908 of 2011 Between: A. Bal Reddy .. Petitioner AND N. Pullaiah .. Respondent C.R.P.No.2911 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy and another .. Petitioners AND N. Pullaiah and 2 others .. Respondents C.R.P.No.2958 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy and another .. Petitioners AND N. Pullaiah and 2 others .. Respondents C.R.P.No.4267 of 2011 Between: R. Buchareddy .. Petitioner AND C. Srinivasa Reddy .. Respondent COMMON ORDER: All these eight Civil Revision Petitions are between the same parties arising out of identical Interlocutory Orders in four suits pending before the Senior Civil Judge’s Court, Wanaparthy, and are, hence, being heard and decided together at the request and with the consent of the learned counsel for both parties. O.S.No.2 of 2008 between the parties is one for specific performance of conditional sale of mortgage property, while O.S.Nos.56 of 2008, 57 of 2008 and 58 of 2008 are for recovery of money. In all the four suits, the trial has made progress with the evidence of both parties being concluded and the matter being at the stage of arguments with the arguments for the plaintiffs being claimed to have been concluded before the trial Court. At that stage, the defendants came up with the Interlocutory Applications and in each suit, they requested for reopening the suit for further evidence of the defendants and to permit them to examine P. Sreerama Rao, Advocate and Chapala Bal Reddy, resident of Pebbair to speak about Exs.B.1 and B.2 marked in each suit. The defendants claimed in the affidavits in support of the applications that Exs.B.1 and B.2 are disputed and denied by the plaintiffs and their counsel, which documents were brought on record through V. Manohar Reddy, an elder and attestor of Exs.B.1 and B.2 examined as DW.3 in all the cases. The defendants, therefore, claimed that Chapala Bal Reddy, the first executant of Ex.B.1 and P. Sreerama Rao, advocate, who is the scribe of Ex.B.1, need to be examined to prove the relevant transactions under Exs.B.1 and B.2. The request was opposed in all the suits by the plaintiffs contending that the Advocate is protected under law from being compelled to be a witness and Exs.B.1 and B.2 being received subject to objection cannot be a ground to allow the defendants to further drag on the proceedings indefinitely. The plaintiffs narrated the long sequence of events in the suits to claim protraction of the proceedings unjustly by the defendants and stated that Ex.B.1 was scribed by the counsel for the plaintiffs, Sri P. Sreerama Rao, at the request of village elders of Pebbair, but nobody signed in his presence on Ex.B.1. The plaintiffs further stated that their counsel stated the same facts before the trial Court during arguments and even if the defendants intended to examine Chapala Bal Reddy as a witness, he could have been examined at the earliest point of time being a close associate of the defendants. The vexatious petitions were, therefore, requested to be negatived. The trial Court in identical orders in all the four cases referred to the rival contentions and the suit being posted to 21-04- 2011 for the arguments of the defendants at which stage these petitions were filed. The trial Court noted that P. Sreerama Rao, an advocate, did not make any earlier statement to enable his being declared as hostile in the event of his not agreeing to the defence version concerning Ex.B.1 and the counsel was not included in the list of witnesses filed by the defendants. The counsel will be deprived of his right to defend the plaintiffs in the suit, if he were to be called as a witness and even if he is examined, he will not state anything more than what he submitted to the Court about his being the scribe of Ex.B.1 with none else signing Ex.B.1 in his presence. The trial Court, apart from thus concluding the advocate to be not a necessary witness, proceeded to consider the relevancy of Chapala Bal Reddy as a witness and found that in O.S.No.186 of 2006 on the file of Junior Civil Judge, Wanaparthy, the defendants and Chapala Bal Reddy contested the suit together through a common written statement and the petitions filed at a very belated stage cannot be permitted when the defendants had already examined as many as five witnesses through whom the registered sale deed-Ex.B.2 could have been proved. The trial Court, therefore, dismissed all the petitions without costs. In these revision petitions, the defendants claimed that summoning the two proposed witnesses will clearly establish through Exs.B.1 and B.2 the absence of any consideration for the suit promissory note in all the three suits for recovery of money. A party could not have been restrained from summoning his witnesses to substantiate his case when the relevancy or validity of the evidence could not have been scrutinized at the time of summoning the witnesses. Sri N. Chandrasekhar Reddy, learned counsel for the revision petitioners, and Sri V. Hanumantha Rao, learned counsel for the respondents are heard. The learned counsel for the respondents has produced copies of plaints, written statements, depositions of DWs.1 and 3 and Exs.B.1 and B.2 in all the four suits for reference and perusal. The point for consideration in all the matters is the justification for the request to examine the two proposed witnesses? While it is true that the written statements in all the four suits did not specifically refer to Exs.B.1 and B.2, even if the evidence of DW.1 in the suits was not specifically referring to Exs.B.1 and B.2, the evidence of DW.3 through whom Exs.B.1 and B.2 were marked and admitted into evidence was permitted to be placed on record by the trial Court. The claim of DW.3 in his chief-examination is about the land belonging to Chapala Bal Reddy and his wife being the subject of an agreement of sale with Yellaiah and his partners in the first instance, with the plaintiffs and some others being added under a second agreement. DW.3 further stated about the events leading to disposal of the lands by Chapala Bal Reddy later to the defendants in view of the discord between Chapala Bal Reddy, the plaintiffs and their partners. DW.3 further stated about the events that were claimed to have taken place at Pebbair Police Station where Ex.B.1 agreement was claimed to have been written by the advocate for the plaintiffs and to have been executed not out of free will and volition of the executant. Ex.B.2-Agreement dated 19-05-2007 was claimed to have been prepared and executed on 19-05-2007 between the parties. While not going into the truth or otherwise of Exs.B.1 and B.2 or their impact on the respective claims of the parties, it has to be, therefore, noted that Exs.B.1 and B.2 having been already permitted to be admitted into evidence through DW.3, any further request of the defendants to produce further evidence in an attempt to probablise or prove Exs.B.1 and B.2 could not have been straight away negatived. If so, it is to be further examined whether the advocate for the plaintiffs and Chapala Bal Reddy, the executants of Ex.B.1, have to be permitted to be examined for that purpose. Insofar as the learned counsel for the plaintiffs before the trial Court is concerned, the professional rights and duties of the advocate vis-à-vis his clients cannot be altogether ignored in considering whether he has to be permitted to be examined as a witness in the dispute by/for the opposite party. Even in the counters of the respondents-plaintiffs in opposition to these applications, it was specifically stated that Ex.B.1 was scribed by Sri P. Sreerama Rao, learned advocate, while the circumstances under which he scribed Ex.B.1 were attempted to be explained as due to the request of the village elders of Pebbair with no others signing Ex.B.1 in his presence. The same statements were also claimed to have been made by the learned advocate himself before the trial Court during the arguments for the plaintiffs and thus, the scribing of Ex.B.1 by the learned advocate is admitted and needs no further proof. If the advocate and the plaintiffs had taken a particular stand about the circumstances under which Ex.B.1 was written by the advocate, as rightly observed by the trial Court, he could not have taken a different stand as a witness and the possibility of subjecting the advocate to cross-examination by the defendants by declaring him as hostile also does not appear feasible under the settled principles under the Evidence Act. The defendants will have every opportunity to prove Exs.B.1 and B.2 and the circumstances arising out of their execution in favour of their defence through any other person who was a party to Exs.B.1 and B.2 with examination of the counsel adding nothing further than what has already been placed on record. In view of the necessity to segregate professional advice from participation in the litigations and the need not to disable the counsel from pursuing his professional obligations to the plaintiffs, there appears no justification for deviating from the conclusions of the trial Court in this regard. However, when it comes to the request for examining Chapala Bal Reddy, the objection of the plaintiffs in their counters is only about the possibility which the defendants had, to examine the said witness much earlier, more so, as the said Chapala Bal Reddy is alleged to be a close associate and relative of the defendants. The allegations, even if true, do not counter the claim that Chapala Bal Reddy is a relevant witness in the light of Exs.B.1 and B.2 with Chapala Bal Reddy being admittedly the original owner of the properties in question. Chapala Bal Reddy thus being a relevant witness and mere absence of diligence in not examining him earlier being not a sufficient ground to deny an opportunity to the defendants to place his version before the Court, the defendants ought to have been permitted at least to the extent of examining him by reopening the evidence subject to, of course, appropriate terms for the inconvenience caused to the opposite side by the delay. Thus, notwithstanding the fact that Chapala Bal Reddy could have been examined earlier by the defendants, he has to be permitted to be examined accordingly reversing the impugned order in question. Accordingly, the orders in I.A.No.816 of 2011 in O.S.No.56 of 2008, I.A.No.823 of 2011 in O.S.No.58 of 2008, I.A.No.821 of 2011 in O.S.No.57 of 2008, I.A.No.818 of 2011 in O.S.No.58 of 2008, I.A.No.817 of 2011 in O.S.No.57 of 2008, I.A.No.824 of 2011 in O.S.No.2 of 2008, I.A.No.819 of 2011 in O.S.No.2 of 2008 and I.A.No.820 of 2011 in O.S.No.56 of 2008 are set aside to the extent of refusing to reopen the matter to examine Chapala Bal Reddy as a witness and confirmed to the extent of refusing to reopen the evidence to enable examining Sri P. Sreerama Rao, advocate, as a witness. The petitions will be allowed in respect of reopening the suits for further evidence and for examining Chapala Bal Reddy as a witness by the defendants on deposit of a sum of Rs.500/- (Rupees five hundred only) each in each suit to the credit of Mandal Legal Services Committee, Wanaparthy, within one week from the date of receipt of these orders by the trial Court. In the event of the petitions being allowed in respect of examination of Chapala Bal Reddy, the defendants shall produce his evidence within fifteen (15) days from the date of the petitions being so allowed. In default of production of Chapala Bal Reddy for being examined as a witness before the trial Court as directed above, the evidence shall be closed. The Civil Revision Petitions are ordered accordingly without costs. _____________________ G. BHAVANI PRASAD, J Date: 01-11-2011 Ksn