This revision application which is by a judgment-debtor under section 25 of the Small Causes Court Act arises in these circumstances. According to the petitioner on the 11th of December 1968, it was served with a show--cause notice issued by the Court of Small Causes at Karachi, in execution proceedings bearing No. F. C. D. 239 of 1968. Before that date the petitioner company claims that it had no knowledge, whatever, of any pro--ceedings against itself. But it is now clear that the execution proceedings arose out of a case bearing No. 121 of 1967 filed before the Union Com-- mittee No. 46 by the respondent, which had been decreed by the concilia--petition Court in favour of the respondent. On the 16th of January 1969, the petitioner-Company filed objections against the execution before the Small Causes Court, the main objection being that the respondent-Company had never been served in the proceedings before the conciliation Court and specifically taking up the objection that the Court had no jurisdiction to try the case under section 3 of the Conciliation Courts Ordinance and also that the summons of the case were not issued in accordance with rule 8 (7) of the Conciliation Courts Rules. Now the Conciliation Court is set up under Ordinance XLIV of 1961 and gives exclusive jurisdiction to the Con--ciliation Courts in respect of certain matters where the amount does not exceed Rs. 1,000; admittedly the amount in this case is only Rs. 1,000 and the objection is not based on that score. Subsection (2) of section 3 of the Ordinance, however, contains a list of matters which are excluded from conciliation and clause (c) of subsection (3) of section 3 reads: "Cases by or against the Central or a Provincial Government or a Public Corporation or a public servant acting in the discharge of his duty." Learned counsel for the petitioner claims that since the petitioner is a company registered under the Companies Act, 1913 it is excluded from the jurisdiction of the Conciliation Court. I am entirely unable to agree; the word `public Corpo--ration' is clearly not the same thing as the company registered under the Companies Act, 1913.
2. The other objection raised really related to a question whether the petitioner had in fact been served in the original proceedings and whether on that account the decree could be regarded as a nullity. The learned Chief Judge of the Small Causes Court heard these objections and upon the next day passed an order which is worth reproducing: "Heard counsel. It is argued that ex parte decree was recorded in the case and as such various objections-legal as well as factual could not be raised. These matters are now raised before me.
Save the objections nothing has been produced in support of the contentions.
(2) It is admitted that application for copies of certain documents was made before the Conciliation Court but those copies have not yet been received. It is acknowledged that no application was moved for setting aside the ex parte order. If there was real grievance the proper course for the judgment-debtor was to apply to the Conciliation Court to set aside the ex parte order so that he could place his own case before it for getting a decision on merits.
(3) As already stated, save the bare word mentioned in type on this paper there is nothing to support the contentions. In that situ--ation I would overrule the objections and direct issue of writ of attachment.
The learned Judge does, it seems, proceed to examine, to some degree at any rate, the question whether there was service or not and does not say in so many words that as an executing Court he could not go behind the decree but that I think is clearly implicit in the last sentence in para-- graph 2 of the order. The clear meaning of that sentence is that a proper remedy for the party, if what is alleged was true, was not to raise objections in the execution Court but to take steps in the Conciliation Court itself.
3. Before me, besides the same objections, which were pressed before the Small Causes Court, learned counsel for the petitioner also claimed that under the Companies Act a company cannot purchase its own shares and that therefore, the judgment and decree of the Conciliation Court is also on that account bad. Now not only was this point never taken up before the Conciliation Court (where of course the petitioner claims that he had not been served) or in the execution Court but it has not been even raised in the revision application which has been filed in this Court. In any case I think that this application for revision has to be dismissed upon a much larger ground and I, therefore, do not propose to deal with this objection.
4. The Small Causes Court was acting as an execution Court in this case having power to do so under section 9 of the Ordinance. It is wells established that an execution Court cannot go behind the decree and, if it is claimed that the decree is wrong or even that it is fraudulent or for any other reason a nullity, the execution Court cannot entertain any such objection. The position I think is well settled and it should suffice to refer to one case only, namely, that reported in S. A. Latif v. Nadir Khan (PLD 1968 Lah. 144), where, Sardar Muhammad Iqbal, J., as he then was, observed: "The executing Court cannot go beyond the decree and it must take the decree as it stands, for the decree is binding and conclusive between the parties. It is not competent for the executing Court to enter into a criticism of decree. It cannot also take notice of the plea of fraud in the executing proceedings. In Pravata v. Digambar, it was held that it was not open to the judgment-debtor to raise the defence of fraud in the course of the execution proceedings. In Sudindra v. Budan, the view taken was: "A question whether the decree was obtained by fraud or collusion is not one which relates to the execution of the decree, but which affects its very subsistence and validity. Such a question can only be raised by a separate suit. In Mohammad Saeed v. Yasin, it has recently been held that a question whether a decree was obtained by fraud or collusion is not one, which relates to the execution of the decree but one which affects its very subsistence and validity and such a question can only be raised by a separate suit. The same view was taken earlier in Ahmed & Co. v.
Muhammad Siddique and it was observed that the executing Court has no power to entertain an objection as to the validity of the decree upon the ground that it was obtained by fraud."
I am in entire agreement and respectful agreement with what the learned Judge said.
5. I myself am acting just now under section 25 of the Small Causes Court Act which authorises the High Court for the purpose of satisfying itself that a decree or order made in any case decided by the Court of Small Causes was according to law, "to call for the case and pass such order with respect thereto as it thinks fit." There is nothing in this section which warrants the proposition that the High Court can exercise a jurisdic--petition not vested in the Small Causes Court itself and indeed even on principle, interference by an appellate or a revisional Court must be confined to pas--sing such orders as are within the jurisdiction of the original Court itself. I have come to the conclusion not only that the Small Causes Court was right but that it had no power to pass any order other than the one which it actually has and it must necessarily follow that I cannot do otherwise.
6. For these reasons I dismiss this application with costs.
S. A. H.