1. ' MUHAMMAD AFZAL ZULLAH, C.J.---This appeal through leave of the Court is directed against a judgment of the Peshawar High Court; whereby Civil revision of the appellant arising out of a pre- emption suit filed by him (appellant now deceased and represented by his L.Rs), was dismissed.
2. ' A decree for possession through pre-emption in respect of Khasra Nos.1317/2526, 2527 and 1319/2529, 1322 was passed in favour of the appellant by the District Court on appeal (the trial Court had dismissed the suit). The appellant was directed to pay Rs,31.53 per Marla as the sale price/pre- emption money after deducting the amount already paid/deposited. The appellant side failed to comply with this order. The plea in this behalf was that the exact amount to be deposited was not specified by the Court and the decree-holder was at a loss to know as to what exact sum was to be deposited. He had also applied for the copy of the decree of the Court hoping to discover the amount to be deposited but that also did not help him. He further made an attempt by approaching the Patwari to ascertain the exact area comprised in the Khasra numbers which were the subject-matter of the decree so that further calculations may be made by him. In doing all this some time was lost, when he was able to ascertain in his own way the balance amount to be deposited by him, which came to only Rs,234.50(as he had already deposited Rs,1,500 out of the total pre-emption amount of Rs,1,734.34) the District Court refused "to oblige him on the ground that the amount was not deposited within the stipulated period of one month". The High Court having upheld this approach of the District Court, leave to appeal was granted as under:-- "The learned Judge in the High Court, while rejecting the revision petition of the petitioner, has observed that if the plaintiff had any doubt about the quantum of the purchase money, the proper course for him was to have moved the Court for its assessment and there was no necessity for him to have resorted to the steps he had actually taken. This observation, no doubt, is correct so far as it goes but to us it appears that it was also the duty of the District Judge to have determined the purchase money which the pre-emptor was required to deposit, as enjoined by Order 20, Rule 14 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The question that arises is whether the District Judge, who was himself partly at fault, was justified in applying the rule regarding the penalty for default in complying with his order with that strictness with which it was actually applied by him in this case."
3. ' Learned counsel borrowing from the observations reproduced above has pressed this appeal accordingly on the same pleas and has also relied on Malik Hayat Ullah and 2 others v. Murad Ali Khan PLD 1972 SC 69.
4. ' Order XX, Rule 14 reads as follows :-- "14.--(1) Where the Court decrees a claim to pre-emption in respect of a particular sale of property and the purchase-money has not been paid into Court, the decree shall--
(a) specify a day on or before which the purchase-money shall be so paid, and
(b) direct that on payment into Court of such purchase-money, together with the costs (if any) decreed against the plaintiff, on or before the day referred to in clause (a), the defendant shall deliver possession of the property to the plaintiff, whose title thereto shall be deemed to have accrued from the date of such payment, but that, if the purchase-money and the costs (if any) are not so paid the suit shall be dismissed with costs.
(2) Where the Court has adjudicated upon rival claims to pre-emption, the decree shall direct, -
(a) if and in so far as the claims decreed are equal in decree that the claim of each pre-emptor complying with the provisions of sub-rule (1) shall take effect in respect of a proportionate share of the property including any proportionate share in respect of which the claim of any pre-emptor failing to comply with the said provisions would, but for such default, have taken effect; and
(b) if and in so far as the claims decreed are different in degree, that the claim of the inferior pre- emptor shall not take effect unless and until the superior pre-emptor has failed to comply with the said provisions.
5. The relevant expressions used in the provision are:-- ' Sale of property ' The purchase money ' Not paid into Court ' Shall be so paid ' On payment into Court of such purchase-money."
6. ' All the words in these expressions lead to a single basic supposition therein that the Court will specify the total purchase-money which has to be paid as total price and that mere specifying the rate per Marla of the land or other measure of parcel of land, would not be enough to satisfy the requirement of law. This perhaps also was the view of the High Court because had it been not so the High Court would not have observed that the appellant could have made an application for the correction by the Court which decreed the suit. If it was the subject-matter of correction by the Court it implies that the Court was required to do it. If so, the next question arises: whether the Court was required to do so or to act rightly only on the application of a party and not as its own original duty. In these circumstances the answer must be that it was the duty of the Court to specify the total purchase-money. That being so, the next question would be if the Court itself was at fault in not performing its duty; whether, this could be made a ground for punishing the decree-holder, the answer must be in the negative. Accordingly, there being no fault of the appellant in taking time for trying to ascertain the exact amount, the District Court was not justified in depriving him of the benefit of the decree. The principle laid down in the case of Siddique Khan's case PLD 1984 SC 289 on the question of specification and payment of court-fee in so far as it can be attracted to situation like the one in this case also helps the appellant.
7. ' In the light of the foregoing discussion this appeal is allowed. The impugned judgments are set aside, case is remanded to the District Court with the direction that the exact amount of pre- emption money and other amount/s, if any, to be paid together with the manner for the deposit shall be specified by the Court. This having been done reasonable further time shall be allowed to the appellant to deposit the same. There shall be no order as to costs.