IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA C.R. No.797 of 2006 DEVENDRA NARAYAN SINGH Versus INDIAN OVERSEAS BANK & ANR. ----------- 7 10.11.2008 Heard Mr. Keshav Shrivastava, Senior Counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Subhash Prasad Singh, Counsel for the opposite party no.1. Strangely, a brother stood guarantor for another brother in a loan taken from the Bank and the Bank when it found itself to be in a helpless situation in the matter of recovery of such loan, took steps against the guarantor, the brother of the original loanee. In the opinion of this Court the Bank was justified in taking steps against the guarantor by invoking the provisions of Section 171 of the Indian Contract Act. The Bank having done so, the guarantor i.e. the petitioner came before the Court and lodged protest that the Bank in all fairness should have first made a genuine effort to recover the amount from the loanee and only in case such genuine efforts had not yielded any fruitful result, it could have proceeded against the petitioner. The issue in hand is as to whether the Court below has committed a jurisdictional error in refusing the prayer of the petitioner to refund that amount which was realized from the Bank Account of the petitioner. 2 The petitioner cannot deny this fact that he has been a signatory as a guarantor which extend his liability co- existensive with the loanee. In fact, Mr. Keshav Srivastava also does not dispute this position. The brother, therefore, has cheated another brother and in that view of the matter, the Bank, a public institution, could not have suffered. It is true that the Bank had to make a sincere effort but on the basis of the materials on record especially paragraph no.5 of the counter affidavit, it cannot be said that the Bank did not make sincere effort in recovery of the loan amount against the original loanee inasmuch as the details have been given with regard to the registered notice and other procedure followed for recovery of the loan against him. In that view of the matter, this Court would not find any jurisdictional error in the impugned order. Of course, the suit is still pending and therefore, it would be still open for the petitioner to make a prayer before the Court in case he can make his brother the original loanee to appear and tender payment for clearing the dues of the Bank. With the aforementioned observations, this civil revision application is hereby dismissed. Rsh (Mihir Kumar Jha, J.)