Mian Ghulam Bari respondent filed a suit for recovery from the petitioners of a sum of Rs.23,625 towards the cost of four Pole Plastic Sign--boards displayed by him on behalf of his clients, which were only improperly and without a semblance of justification removed to be ultimately retained by them unlawfully; and also as compensation for the resulting damage due to loss of goodwill in business and mental torture caused to him by their tortious acts committed without regard to his having already paid the rental and electricity charges for the installation and illumination of those boards. Defendants contested the suit by denying the merits and also raising a number of technical objections. Necessary issues were settled and parties led their evidence, upon a meticulous consideration whereof learned trial Judge held that despite the payment made by the plaintiff before the expiry of time fixed for the purpose, the disconnection order was issued and implemented illegally and arbitrarily in utter disregard of the payments made well before the due date and four Pole Plastic Sign-boards were removed from their sites and were admitted to be lying with the defendants. He reached the foregoing conclusions upon a close scrutiny of the relevant Bills and the admissions during the cross-examination made by D.Ws. 1 and 2 who had been examined by the defendants as the witnesses of truth. In result, finding the grievance of the plaintiff completely justified on facts, learned trial Judge decreed the suit by his judgment dated 14-5-1985 to award the respective amounts against the defendants.
2. Appeal there against filed by the defendants came up for consideration before a learned Additional District Judge who made an exhaustive re--appraisal of the evidence adduced by the parties and came to the conclusion, "these facts clearly show that disconnection of the Sign- boards displayed by the respondent was illegal and not warranted by law". He affirmed the findings of the trial Court with the observations reproduced hereunder:-- "The perusal of these bills issued by the WAPDA Authority will show thatno score the respondent seems to be defaulter in the payment of electricity charges. The bills Exh. P. 5 to Exh. P. 7 are paid and pertain to plastic signs pertaining to Bata Shoes, Millat Fans and Asia Fans. The bills have been paid up to 12/80 to 12/81 and from 23-4-1980 to 23-8-1981 which means that respondent has not committed any illegality and disconnection notice Exh. P. 8 issued by the appellants was not according to the relevant facts The bills Exh.P.5 to Exh. P. 7 which are subject-matter of this case were paid in time before the expiry of last date which is 10-6-1981 and disconnection order Exh. P. 8 issued by the appellants was issued without waiting for the last date of payment. The dispute relates regarding four Signboard of Bata Shoes, Asia Fan and Millat Fans. The record reveals that respondent had made the payment and the appellants were not justified to remove the same."
As regards the award of the amount claimed by the plaintiff in the suit, learned appellate Judge observed that the defendants had not brought any material to show otherwise or that the costs or damages were lesser than those estimated by the plaintiff and decreed by the trial Court.
3. Defendants have now come up to this Court on revision. Learned counsel for the petitioners has raised the following contentions:--
(a) that the pole signboards were justifiably removed by the defendants on account of non- payment of the dues;
(b) that the compensation for the relevant four Pole signboards has been improperly awarded without regard to the fact that the defendants do not have any desire to purchase them or own them for ever by paying their price, which too has been so determined in absence of proper proof, inasmuch as they are simply useless for them but they have been seized only for the time being merely for prompting payment of the WAPDA dues and hence there was no occasion to compensate the plaintiff for the alleged refund to his clients which has not even been satisfactorily proved;
(c) that the alleged loss of goodwill and sufferance of mental torture are too remote consequences of the act complained of to be compensated by award of damages; and
(d) that, at any rate, there is no proof available on the record about the measure of damages awarded and, hence, decretal of an arbitrarily claimed sum is not sustainable.
4. I have given anxious consideration to the afore-noted contentions and do not find substance in any of them.
As regards the first contention, there are concurrent findings of fact, perfectly justified on the record, reached by the two Courts below to the effect that there was nothing outstanding against the plaintiff who had already paid up the dues well within time and there was no justification for the defendants to have acted in the manner that they had. Learned counsel has not referred to any law authorising the course of action of the defendants who certainly are not the authorities of distrait under the law to be able to seize any property, to their mere pleasure. He has not even pointed out any error of jurisdiction or law to have been committed by the Courts below in reaching the said concurrent findings relating to questions of pure fact which, as such, are treated as sacrosanct at the subsequent stages of litigation and cannot be thrown open for being reconsidered by the higher forums who, it is quite well---settled, cannot be invited to interfere therewith even on the ground that the same evidence is capable also of leading to a different conclusion, contrary to the one reached below concurrently and much-less may those Courts interfere therewith for the reason that if they were to decide the same questions while considering a first appeal they would have themselves reached that other conclusion on the basis of same evidence. The controversy desired to be raised in this case stands thus foreclosed by the said concurrent findings and hence the contention fails.
Next is the matter about compensation for the relevant Signboards. There is no question of the defendants being thereby compelled to become the unwilling purchasers of those boards. Such a concept cannot be imported in the monetary loss of the plaintiff, consequent from his deprivation of the property, being recompensed by the defendants who are proved and even admitted to be the only source of such a deprival. But if they really did not intend to own or possess the relevant signboards then it was for them to have so pleaded in the trial Court where they did not take up such a position by pleading or even by their conduct and in the absence of any law authorising their seizure of the signboards their liability to pay the price arises just on account of their unlawful removal whereby they become designated as stolen --property. Be the above as it may, case not set-up by a party in his pleadings cannot be urged and a new point is not open to be taken up by the defendants at this third stage of the litigation, therefore, there is no need of dwelling upon it any further. The plaintiffs evidence about the price of the signboards and the amount refunded to his clients has been left uncontroverted by the defendants who cannot evade their liability for reimbursing the plaintiff for them in the proved circumstances of this case. This contention is also repelled accordingly.
Then comes the contention about remote consequences. There is no cavil with the proposition of law that in cases of breach of contracts no compensation is open to be provided for remote and indirect damage sustained on account of breach. So is provided in section 73 of the Contract Act but this is not a case of mere breach of contract and is additionally, a case also of tortious acts committed by the defendants which have formed; foundation of the various claims urged by the respondent in his plaint and none of them is ascribable merely to breach of contract. Moreover, it is not quite understandable as to hovel may the two sufferances of the plaintiff in his profession and mind be capable of being called the remote or indirect consequences of the acts complained of and proved against the defendants who have not cared to contest the existence of such damages on a factual plane and have left the plaintiffs evidence thereabout only unrefuted. In that situation, even the third contention becomes untenable and liable to be repulsed accordingly.
The last contention with regard to the quantum of damages is also incapable of cutting any ice inasmuch as the plaintiff's estimation thereof was not tried by the defendants to be controverter by suggesting any other amount and they just contented themselves by leaving the case as liable to be determined either way in the two extremes, i.e., the relief being completely refused or granted in its entirety, depending upon the facts to be ultimately found. They did not even lead any evidence to be suggestive of awarding any other amount as compensation so that the Court was left with no choice than entering up a decree in accordance with its findings about the merits of the case and since the plaintiff's right to the award of compensation had been established uncontrovertably, therefore, his claim for the sum in suit was rightly decreed. Reference in this context may advantageously be made to the judgment of a learned Division Bench of this Court delivered in Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation v. Aziz Qureshi, reported as PLD 1965 (W.P.) Karachi 202, wherein it was held that mere failure of a plaintiff in a suit for damages to furnish evidence for ascertaining details of damages is no ground for granting only nominal damages and the Court is itself competent to ascertain quantum of damages in the circumstances of a case. Thus, in the case in hand, the entire claim of the plaintiff has been rightly decreed in the exigency of the circumstances pointed out above. Contention raised on behalf of the petitioners is only preposterous and is rejected.
6. Result of the foregoing is that the decrees passed by: the two Courts below are unexceptionable and there is no case made out for interference in exercise of revisional jurisdiction. Hence, the revision petition is dismissed with the plaintiff-respondent's costs all along being liable to be paid by the defendant-petitioners.