This revision petition impugning the dismissal of the petitioners' appeal against the order of the learned 'Civil Judge, Narowal, dated the 22nd November, 1988, setting aside the arbitration award and remitting the matter in dispute to the arbitrators for adjudication, arises out of the following circumstances. Rafaqat A.I (petitioner 1) and Saadat A.I (petitioner 2), sons of Karamat A.I, occupied the shop in dispute, situate in Railway Bazar of Narowal, as tenants under Mubarik A.I, respondent.
To settle their dispute touching the shop the parties appointed by deed of agreement dated the 31st October, 1977, Exh. C.2, Chaudhry Hafeez Ullah, Petition-writer, C.W. 1, Ghulam Muhammad, Contractor, C.W. 2, and Haji Mushtaq Hussain, shopkeeper, C.W.3, all of Narowal, as arbitrators for deciding rent and price of the shop. On the 6th November, 1977, the arbitrators gave the award which is embodied m Exh C.1 and which runs as follows.-
2. On the 19th February, 1978, the arbitrators moved in the Civil Court of Narowal application for getting the award made rule of the Court. When the learned trial Court took up preliminary hearing of the application on the 21st February, 1978, Chaudhry Abdul Hamid Dar, Advocate, put in appearance on behalf of Rafaqat A.I and Saadat A.I (petitioners). Chaudhry Abdul Hamid Dar was directed to file his power-of-attorney and notice was ordered to be issued to Mubarik A.I (respondent) for the 8th March, 1978. On the last mentioned date though Mubarik A.I and Rafaqat A.I were present, none from amongst the arbitrators (who had filed the application) entered appearance and, therefore, the learned Court dismissed the application for non-prosecution.
3. On the 9th March 1978, Haji Mushtaq Hussain, one of the arbitrators, moved application for restoration of the application for making the award rule of the Court which had been dismissed on the 8th March, 1978. The learned Court, after holding some proceedings spread over various dates, passed order on the 4th April, 1978, restoring the application.
4. Mubarik A.I (respondent) gave application on the 20th April, 1978, opposing the arbitrators' move for getting the award made rule of the Court and seeking rejection of their application. He averred that the arbitrators had been asked only to determine the price and rent of the shop but they had given one-sided decision in favour of the petitioners whom they had given the option of exercising every type of choice. He complained that he had not been given any opportunity of producing evidence in support of his case and that the arbitrators had formulated their award without any evidence. He blamed them for being guilty of misconduct. The petitioners controverted his assertions and maintained that the award was in order. They said that the respondent's application for setting aside the award was out of time.
5. The learned trial Court found the respondent's application to have been brought within time of thirty days fixed by Article 158 of the first Schedule of the Limitation Act, 1908. As mentioned above the application for making the award rule of the Court had been dismissed on the 8th March, 1978, and it was restored on the 5th April, 1978. Excluding the time between the dismissal and restoration of application the respondent's application would be taken to be within time.
6. The learned Court noticed that the arbitrators had made no written record of arbitration proceedings nor they had given opportunity to the respondent to produce evidence in support of his case before them. As a matter of fact the arbitrators did not invite evidence from either side. In these circumstances they were found to have misconducted the proceedings and as such their award was set aside. The learned Additional District Judge, Narowal, by his judgment of the 4th May, 1978, endorsed in appeal the decision of the learned trial Court. Feeling aggrieved the petitioners invoked the revisional jurisdiction of this Court.
7. When the revision petition came up for preliminary hearing before this Court, Chaudhry Khurshid Ahmad, Advocate, the learned counsel for the petitioners, stated that the petitioners had no concern with the purchase of the property in dispute at the price fixed in the award nor would they exercise option of purchasing the property and that they were only concerned with payment of rent fixed by the arbitrators in their award and since the question of rent was separable from the subject of sale of the property to which the respondent was not agreeable there was no need of remission of the award and that the award to the extent of rent could be made rule of the Court. As the petitioners extinguished their interest with the purchase of the property, which was being seriously objected to by the respondent and expressed their concern only with the rent of the shop as adjudged by the arbitrators, revision petition was admitted to regular hearing. However, on the 18th December, 1978, Chaudhry Khurshid Ahmad, Advocate, filed application (C. M. No. 12/C of 1989) accompanied by his affidavit that when he had gone out of Court he had met the petitioners (not specified whether petitioner 1 or petitioner 2) who had declined to give up his right of repurchase.
Chaudhry Khurshid Ahmad said that he had made statement before this Court on the 17th December--- 1988, without consulting the petitioners who were not present in the Court room. He submitted that the petitioners wanted to have decision on the crucial point regarding purchase of the shop at the stated price and were not contented simply with the portion of the award specifying the rent of the shop.
8. Support to the concurrent findings of the learned Courts below that the respondent had not been offered opportunity of producing evidence and that the arbitrators had misconducted the proceedings can easily by gathered from the depositions of the arbitrators on the record. In such circumstances the award upon the disputed point of price of the shop and its sale could not be sustained and had to be set aside. In that view of the matter the impugned decision of the learned trial and the appellate Courts are unexceptionable and demand no interference in revision.
Consequently the revision petition cannot but be dismissed.