Judgment:
CR No.4008 of 2014 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH CR No.4008 of 2014 Date of Decision: 30.06.2014 Manish Jain ....Petitioner Versus Bhupinder Kumar Jain and others ....Respondents CORAM:- HON'BLE Mr.JUSTICE RAJIV NARAIN RAINA Present: Mr.S.C.Arora, Advocate, for the petitioner.
1.
To be referred to the Reporters or not?.
2.
Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?.
RAJIV NARAIN RAINA, J.(Oral) When a defence against the suit is taken on entirely new pleas/grounds beyond what is contemplated in the plaint then the defendant is bound to produce documents in support of its stand in defence in terms of Order 8 Rule 1-A of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (for short “the Code”.).Other than the will of late Jyoti Parsad Jain none of the other documents mentioned by the plaintiff in his application filed under Order 11 Rule 14 read with Order 8 Rule 1-A read with Section 151 of the Code for production of their originals which are relied on and in possession of the defendants as enumerated in para.5 of the application have been produced in defence of the suit or in the written statement.
The learned trial Court in para.7 of the impugned order has recorded that it is a matter of the respective parties to decide as to what evidence they need to bring on record and the Court cannot compel its production.
With these observations, the application has been disallowed.
In the situation obtaining from the passing of the impugned order, Mittal Manju 2014.07.02 11:19 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CR No.4008 of 2014 -2- there can be two ways forward.
One is to compel the defendants to produce all documents in support of their stand under Order 8 Rule 1-A of the Code or for the court to pass an order barring production of those documents at the stage of evidence.
The trial Court would keep in mind these two options and decide what to do best in the interest of justice after hearing the respective counsel for the parties.
It is well to remember in litigation no party should be allowed to be taken by surprise by the opponent.
The court should insist that parties put all their cards on the table for both to see and make of and to lead their evidence accordingly.
With this, the petition is accepted.
The matter is remitted for passing a fresh order.
Till such time a fresh order is not passed, the impugned order shall stand inoperative.
(RAJIV NARAIN RAINA) JUDGE3006.2014 manju Mittal Manju 2014.07.02 11:19 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh