On what grounds an application for permission to sue as an indigent person can be rejected?

Question: On what grounds an application for permission to sue as an indigent person can be rejected?

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Answer

Order XXXIII Rule 2 CPC which provides that “every application for permission to sue as an indigent person shall contain the particulars required in regard to plaints in suits; a schedule of any movable or immovable property belonging to the applicant, with the estimated value thereof, shall be annexed thereto; and it shall be signed and verified in the manner prescribed for signing and verification of pleadings”.

Rule 5 of Order XXXIII CPC provides for rejecting an application filed under Order XXXIII Rule 3 CPC which specifically states that the Courts shall reject the application for permission to sue as an indigent person:

• where it is not framed and presented in the manner prescribed by rules 2 and 3, or
• where the applicant is not an indigent person, or
• where he has, within two months next before the presentation of the application disposed of any property fraudulently or in order to be able to apply for permission to sue as an indigent person:

Provided that no application shall be rejected if, even after the value of the property disposed of by the applicant is taken into account, the applicant would be entitled to sue as an indigent person, or

• where his allegations do not show a cause of action, or
• where he has entered into any agreement with reference to the subject matter of the proposed suit under which any other person has obtained an interest in such subject-matter, or
• where the allegations made by the applicant in the application show that the suit would be barred by any law for the time being in force, or
• where any other person has entered into an agreement with him to finance the litigation.

Moreover, by a subsequent order, the plaint may become insufficiently stamped if by an amendment any additional claim is allowed to be made, and in such a case even though the plaint is validly accepted, it would become invalid by virtue of its being deficit stamped on account of a subsequent event. One such event is the death of a pauper plaintiff.

As observed in the case of Santoksingh And Anr. v. Radheshyam And Anr [AIR 1975 Bom 5] the death of the pauper plaintiff may not affect the time of the institution of the suit, but if as a result of the ceasing of the Condition precedent for the suit being prosecuted without payment of Court-fee a plaint becomes invalid, the Court has the only alternative of asking a person who wants to continue the suit to pay the requisite Court-fee or to prove to the Court that he also deserves the same privilege which the deceased pauper had, namely, of prosecuting the suit without payment of proper Court-fee.

When the plaint in a suit is understated and the plaintiff, who wants to prosecute the suit, has failed to comply with the order under Section 149 of the Code the ‘plaint’ will have to be dealt with as provided for in Order VII of the Code. Such a plaint has to be rejected under Rule 11(c) of Order VII.

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