Civil Revision No. 1386 of 2009 -1- **** IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Revision No. 1386 of 2009 Date of decision: 16.03.2009. Sham Dass ...Petiitioner Versus Thakurdwara Almarful Dayal and others ...Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE S.D.ANAND. Present: Mr. Sachin Mittal, Advocate, for the petitioners. ***** S.D.ANAND, J. The plaintiffs-respondents filed a suit for the restraint of the defendants therein from interfering in former's possession of the Mandir and other properties attached thereto including the agricultural land. The plea raised by the plaintiffs-respondents was that they were asking for the aforementioned restraint order in their capacity as Mahant, Mohatmin and Gaddi Nashin of Thuakurdwara Dayal Wala, Sadhaura, District Yamuna Nagar. The suit was filed in the year 2000. In the written statement filed on 11.4.2001, the defendant-petitioner conceded the status of the plaintiffs- respondents as Mahant, Mohatmin and Gaddi Nashin of Thuakurdwara Dayal Wala, Sadhaura, District Yamuna Nagar. However, the suit could not be disposed of inspite thereof for one reason or the other. It was long thereafter that the defendant-petitioner filed a plea for amendment of the written statement in order to obtain the leave of the Court to wriggle out of that admission. The plea, raised in support thereof, Civil Revision No. 1386 of 2009 -2- **** was that the admission aforementioned was wrong in character and was a result of suppression of true facts and that the filing thereof (i.e. the written statement) came to his notice in the course of the certain proceedings pending between the parties before the police. The learned Trial Court negatived the plea by observing that the defendant-petitioner could not be allowed to obliterate the admission made by him in the course of the written statement aforementioned. I have heard Mr. Sachin Mittal, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner and carefully gone through the file. I have been through the application filed by the defendant- petitioner under Order 6 Rule 17 C.P.C. for amendment of the written statement. There is an averment, in the course thereof, that they became cognizant of that admission “when the said Raghbir Dass etc. have placed a copy thereof before the Local Police, where a complaint against Raghbir Dass etc. is pending.” Qua the admission, it was averred that the pleadings had been “obtained under duress and concealment”. In order to find out the bonafides of the defendant-petitioner, I called upon the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner to indicate the exact or approximate date when the factum of aforesaid admission came to the notice of the petitioner in the course of the proceedings pending before the Police. The poser drew a blank from the learned counsel for the petitioner. Besides it, the petitioner has also not indicated the manner in which the admission aforementioned had been obtained from him under duress particularly when the written statement had been filed through a counsel. In order to obtain the invalidation of the impugned order, the learned counsel for the petitioner relies upon Harshad Chiman Lal Modi Civil Revision No. 1386 of 2009 -3- **** Vs. DLF Universal and another 2005 (4) RCR (Civil) 260 and Harwinder Singh Vs.Balwinder Singh and others 2004 (3) Punjab Law Reporter, 126. The rulings aforementioned are inapplicable to the case before this Court. In Harshad Chiman Lal Modi's case (supra), the defendants had admitted the jurisdiction of the concerned Court in the course of the written statement; whereas, infact, that Court had no jurisdiction to hold the trial. The Apex Court held that a plea for amendment for the ouster of Civil Court jurisdiction, could be validly raised and the plaint returned to the plaintiff for presentation before the proper Court. In Harwinder Singh's case (supra), a Coordinate Bench of this Court found, as a fact, that the defendants who had applied for the amendment of the written statement to wriggle out of admission had given an explanation in the context. In the present case, the averment in the context are vague as already noticed. In the light of the foregoing discussion, the petition is held to be denuded of merit and is ordered to be dismissed in limine. March 16, 2009 (S.D.Anand) Pka Judge