2.Brief facts of the case are that petitioner and respondent No.1 jointly took lease of about 5/1-2 squares of agricultural land situated in Chak No. 60/12-L, Tehsil Chichawatni belonging to Wasim Sadiq etc. In 1987 in equal shares. It was agreed between them that they will jointly cultivate it and capital investment like payment of lease money and provision of tractors, seeds, fertilizers, pesticides etc. Would be made by respondent No.1 while the petitioner will personally cultivate and supervise the cultivation of the land through manpower. It was also agreed that at the end of each harvest, the not profits would be divided equally between the parties after deduction of expenses from the gross proceeds of crops. It is alleged in the plaint that respondent No. l provided two tractors owned solely by him to the petitioner for this purpose and other implements were purchased by the parties through equal contribution. Abovesaid two tractors and other implements were in possession of the petitioner. Respondent No. l paid the entire lease money to the lessors till Rabi 1995 crops. The venture amicably continued between the parties till Kharif 1993 crops. Accounts were duly settled and the profits divided between them till the said crop. In January, 1994 the relationship between the parties became strained. Pursuant to refusal on the part of the petitioner to render accounts and pay the profits to the respondent civil litigation commenced between the parties. A suit for permanent and mandatory injunction was filed by the respondent against the petitioner on 28-5-1994 before Civil Court, Chichawatni seeking an order for the storage and preservation of Rabi Crops 1994. Temporary injunction was issued in favour of the respondent which was allegedly violated by the petitioner whereupon an application was submitted against him for flouting the injunctive order. Said application is still pending before Ch. Muhammad Hussain, Civil Judge, Chichawatni.
3. Another suit for declaration and permanent injunction, out of which instant petition has arisen, was filed by the respondent on 16-11-1994 in the abovesaid Civil Court wherein it was prayed that he be declared the sole exclusive owner of both the tractors and joint owner of all the other agricultural implements in equal share with the petitioner and he (petitioner) be restrained from selling, using or damaging the said machinery. One Riasat A.I was appointed in this suit as a referee by the parties vide order of the Court dated 18-6-1995 .
4. Another suit was filed by respondent on 19-7-1994 against the petitioner in the Civil Court at Vehari with the prayer that the petitioner be restrained from selling the potatoes belonging to the parties and stored in cold storages. Petitioner deposited a sum of Rs. 2,34,401 as the price of these potatoes with said Riasat A.I and the suit was withdrawn on 12-9-1995.
5. The case of respondent No. l is that the parties appointed said Riasat A.I as sole arbitrator through arbitration agreement dated 16-2-1995 to give his award after hearing the parties and going through all the disputes arising out of said joint venture, Riasat A.I gave award on 21-9-1995 against the respondent, who challenged it through his application dated 15-10-1995, moved undersections 14, 30 and 33 of the Arbitration Act, 1940. Aforementioned Riasat A.I appeared before the learned Civil Judge, Chichawatni on 19-10-1995, who got his statement recorded on 19-10-1995 as referee. The respondent on the same very day filed an application before the trial Court to revoke the appointment of Riasat4Ali as referee on the ground that the parties had appointed him as an arbitrator; he having already given his award on 21-9-1995 regarding subject --matter of the suit and all other matters in dispute between the parties and because of his grave misconduct was no more qualified to remain as referee and to record his statement as such. Learned Civil Judge vide his order dated 19-10-1995 rejected the application of the respondent observing that statement of referee. Has already been recorded. However, final order was not passed by the learned Civil Judge, Chichawatni, who sent the case to learned District Judge for transfer to , some other Court. Learned District Judge vide order dated 24-10-1995 transferred the case to the Court of Mr. Jamshed Hussain, Civil Judge Ist Class, Sahiwal.
6. The respondent challenged the order dated 19-10-1995 before the learned District Judge, Sahiwal through civil revision, who vide impugned judgment set aside the order of the learned Civil Judge as well as statement of so-called referee which was recorded in absence of the respondent, with direction to the learned Trial Court to decide the case on merits without considering the statement of the referee, in accordance with law. Learned Revisional Court directed the parties to appear before the trial Court on 23-6-1996. Petitioner has challenged the said judgment in this petition, as mentioned above.
7. Learnerd counsel for the petitioner contends that Ch. Riasat A.I was appointed by the parties as 'referee' and his decision was binding on them as they have given an undertaking that they will accept the decision of said Ch. Riasat A.I. Since he has made a statement against the respondent, same should be accepted and he cannot be allowed to wriggle out of it on the pretext that Riasat A.I was an arbitrator and not referee. He further submits that the facts and circumstances of the case do not justify the setting aside of order and proceedings of the learned Civil Judge dated 19- 10-1995 and as such impugned judgment is illegal and liable to be quashed. He has relied upon Attiqullah v. Kafayatullah (1981 SCMR 162), Mehr Din and 2 others v. Siraj Din and 2 others (PLD 1980 Baghdadul Jadid 45) and Salhoon v. Mst. Jawai and another (1983 CLC 1436) in support of his plea.
8. Learned counsel for the petitioner also submits that revision petition before leprted District Judge was not competent as the value of the suit for purposes of jurisdiction was more than six lacs as spelled out from the plaint itself. He has relied upon amendment introduced in section 18 of the Ordinance XI of 1962 whereby pecuniary jurisdiction of District Judge has been raised from Rs.50,000 to Rs.2,00.000, and beyond this amount revision could only be entertained by the High Court.
9. On the other hand learned counsel for respondent No. l submits that this petition has arisen out of an interim order and as such is not maintainable. He has relied upon Muhammad Sharif v. M.
Afzal Sohail etc. Submits that Riasat A.I was not 'a referee but an arbitrator. He has referred to Sher Zaman Khan v. Noor Zaman Khan and another (PLD 1977 Lah. 672) and submits that distinction between 'referee' and 'arbitrator' has been exhaustively made by the learned Single Judge of this Court in the abovesaid judgment, which is strictly applicable to the facts of the present case. He maintains that Ch. Riasat A.I was an arbitrator and not a referee in view of the facts and circumstances of the instant case.
Regarding valuation of the suit for purposes of court-fee and jurisdiction, he submits that the value given in the plaint would be presumed to be correct unless changed by the Court. He states that the petitioner valued the suit for purposes of court-fee and jurisdiction at Rs.5,000 which has to be presumed correct.. He further submits that question of jurisdiction having not been raised before the revisional Court, petitioner cannot be permitted at this stage to agitate the same particularly when no prejudice has been caused to him. He has relied upon A.I Muhammad and others v.
Muhammad Shaft and others (PLD 1996 Supreme Court 292) in support of his contention. He further submits that learned District Judge has exercised his revisional jurisdiction and the impugned order cannot by any stretch of imagination said to have been passed without. Lawful authority. In support of his contention, learned counsel has relied upon Noor Muhammad v. Sarwar Khan and 2 others (PLD 1985 Supreme Court 131).
11. 1 have heard the learned counsel for the parties and gone through the record and the judgments referred above. There is no force to the contentions of the learned counsel for the petitioner. The revision petition before the learned District Judge was competent as valuation of Rs.5,000 given in the plaint for purposes of court-fee and jurisdiction had not been altered by the order of the Court till passing of the impugned judgment. Learned District Judge has revisional jurisdiction in all the cases where value of the subject-matter of the suit is up to Rs.2,00,000. In the present proceedings value of the*suit was Rs.5.000 as assessed by the respondent, therefore, learned revisional Court had the jurisdiction to hear the revision petition. Judgment reported as A.I Muhammad and others v. Muhammad Shaft (PLD 1996 SC 292) clearly supports the contention of learned counsel for the respondent wherein it has been held that an Appellate Court was precluded from entertaining an objection as to the jurisdiction of the trial Court or a lower Appellate Court founded on the ground of over-valuation or under-valuation unless such objection, to the case of the Court of first instance was raised by the party at or before the hearing of the case when the issues were settled in the case and in the case of lower appellate Court the objection had been raised in the memo of appeal. Another condition, which required to be satisfied for entertaining the above objection was that the Appellate Court must record its reasons of satisfaction that the suit or appeal was over- valued or under-valued and that the over-valuation or under-valuation had prejudicially affected the disposal of the suit or appeal on its merits. While interpreting subsection (2) of section 11 of the Suits Valuation Act, 1887, their lordships of the Supreme Court further observed that said provision provides that where an objection had been raised by the party in the manner as stated in section 11(1) of the Act but the Appellate Court was not satisfied with regard to existence of conditions mentioned in section 11(1)(b) and it had material available before it for determining the other grounds of appeal, it would proceed to dispose of the appeal as if there had been no defect of jurisdiction in the Court of first instance or lower Appellate Court as the case may be. Subsection
(3) of section 11 of the Act further provides that where an objection has been raised by the party as required in section 11(1)(a) of the Act and the Court is satisfied with regard to the presence of the conditions mentioned in section 11(1)(b) and it also finds that it does not have sufficient material before it to decide the appeal, it should proceed to dispose of the same in accordance with the rules applicable to the hearing of the appeal.
12. The judgment of the Supreme Court referred above clinches the entire objection of the petitioner's counsel with regard to competency of learned District Judge to entertain and dispose of the revision petition. Thus learned 8 District Judge has competently decided the revision petition instituted before him and instead the present writ petition is not competent. It has been held by the Supreme Court in Muhammad Sharif and another v. Muhammad Afzal Sohail (PLD 1981 SC 246):-- "Notwithstanding the fact that the Legislature in its wisdom has abolished the second appeal in cases under the West Pakistan Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance, 1959 and has made the` orders of the District Judge as final yet parties probably after obtaining legal advice, have taken to filing writ petition in the High Court against the final order passed by the Appellate Court, merely to take another chance or to delay their eviction, hoping that the matter shall take considerable time to be disposed of or that in any case the High Court while dismissing their writ petition may be persuaded to allow further time for vacating the premises in question. The writ petitions are argued before the High Court as if they are regular second appeals and we notice that the learned Judges of the High Court take great pains to re--appraise the evidence and to consider each and every contention raised by the petitioner's side before deciding the petition without realising that more often than not. Such petitions are merely a device to circumvent the amendment in the law and defeat the obvious intention of the Legislature, namely a speedy determination of cases under the Urban Rent Restriction Ordinance. Such frivolous applications not only cause the poor litigants to incur necessary expenditure but also result in waste of valuable public time and should therefore be discouraged by the High Court. It has been repeatedly held that a tribunal having jurisdiction to decide the matter is competent to decide rightly or wrongly and the mere fact that another conclusion could be arrived at from the evidence does not make it a case for interference in the exercise of its Constitutional jurisdiction."
13. Similarly in Abdul Rehman Bajwa v. Sultan and others (PLD 1981 Supreme Court 522) while interpreting section 439-A, Cr.P.C. As added by Law Reforms Ordinance (XII of 1972) vis-a-vis Article 199 of the Constitution it was held that: "Legislature having enacted section 439-A and curtailed jurisdiction of High Court in order to relieve High Court of burden of deciding thousands of revisions against orders of hundreds of Magistrate, filing of petitions for writ against judgments of final Court, held, amounts to circumventing law and defeating obvious intention of Legislature. "
14. It has also been held by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Noor Muhammad v. Sarwar Khan and others (PLD 1985 Supreme Court 131):-- "Neither impugned order passed by Executing Court nor that passed by District Judge in his revisional jurisdiction, could by any stretch of imagination, be said to be illegal or to have been passed without lawful authority--Constitutional petition against such order, held not competent-- Mere fact that decision of a Court on a question of fact or law was not correct, did not necessarily render it "without lawful authority"--Tendency to file Constitutional petitions against orders of Courts having jurisdiction to pass these orders, desired by Supreme Court to be curbed. "
15. As the main suit is still pending, this writ petition arising out of an interim order is not competent in view of the tenoer of the judgments referred to above.
16. Now coming to the judgments referred by the learned counsel for the petitioner, suffice it to say that none of these judgments deals with any matter under the Arbitration Act, and all of them are under the Oaths Act and relate to the proposition where special oath was offered by one party, accepted and administered by other for resolution of particular dispute between them, therefore, they are distinguishable. In the present case the matter was referred to the Arbitrator as is evident from the agreement referred above that Ch. Riasat A.I shall decide the controversy between the parties. The provisions of Arbitration Act, 1940 are attracted to the proceedings because appointment of Ch. Riasat A.I was in fact that of 'Arbitrator' and not of a 'referee'. A 'referee' speaks from his own knowledge or belief and not on basis of inquiries made by him or collection of evidence. He has to make statement of his own personal knowledge. The judgment relied upon by the learned District Judge. Sher Zaman Khan v. Noor Zaman Khan and another (PLD 1977 Lahore 672) is fully applicable to the facts of the present case. Relevant portion of this judgment from para. 5 is reproduced as under:-- "Applying these principles to the facts of the present case it will be seen that although the reference was a reference under section 20 of the Evidence Act and Rafiq A.I Khan was expected to make a statement presumably before the Court on the basis of his knowledge/or belief and not on the basis of inquiries made by him in a judicial manner, the agreement to reference ceased to be effective as soon as Mr. Rafiq A.I Khan appeared on the 22nd of November, 1975 and impliedly proved his ignorance about the matter and his inability to make such a statement. This inability is also supported by the report made by him later on which is a finding based upon evidence of witness and judicial inquiry conducted by him. In these circumstances the report of Mr. Rafiq A.I Khan could not be treated to be a statement under section 20 of the Evidence Act. It is in fact an award. As he was not accepted by the parties as an arbitrator, the learned trial Court should have refused to act upon his report and allowed the petitioner to resile from his agreement. "
17. In the present case it is clearly established that Ch. Riasat A.I was appointed as arbitrator on 16- 2-1995 to give his award on the disputes arisen between the parties after making an inquiry. He has not made the statement purely on the basis of his knowledge of the facts of the case and the moment he entered upon the inquiry, so authorized under the agreement, by no stretch o imagination, he can be termed as. 'referee'. For all intents and purposes, he was arbitrator, therefore, learned District Judge has rightly set aside his statement and the proceedings dated 19- 10-1995 through the impugned judgment.
18. The order of the learned District Judge directing the learned Trial Court to decide the case on merits has not caused any prejudice to the petitioner. Fair opportunity has been provided to the parties by learned District Judge while directing the Civil Judge to decide the case on merits considering the statement of said Riasat A.I as non-existent after recording evidence of the parties.
For the foregoing reasons, this petition is dismissed leaving the parties to bear their own costs.