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TMI Blog1980 (9) TMI 291X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... o hearing had been granted to him before the amount was certified as due and recoverable from him as arrears of land revenue. The writ petition was decided against the appellant on 30-9-1969 and the judgment is reported as 1970 KLJ 176 The appellant subsequently filed a suit for injunction seeking to restrain the State from making recovery of the said amount That suit failed in the trial court and the first appeal too was dismissed by the appellate court. The appellant then came up in a second appeal to this Court, When the case came up for arguments before a learned single Judge of this Court (Hon. Mufti J. as his Lordship then was), it was argued that the order of recovery was vitiated by the fact that no hearing had been granted to the appellant before the amount was certified as due from him. It was argued that even an administrative order involving civil consequences must, according to the settled principles of law, be made after notice to the person likely to be affected by the order and after affording him a reasonable opportunity to be heard in the matter and in that view the correctness of the view expressed by the Division Bench in Abdul Samad Pandit v. State reported in ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ve to be dismissed as barred by res judicata, irrespective of the answer to the first question. 5. The facts, as already noticed, are not in dispute. It is an admitted case of the parties that in the earlier writ petition filed by the appellant he had raised the precise question that before the amount was certified as due from him, he had a right to be heard in the matter and that an order made without affording him that opportunity stood vitiated. The plea of the appellant was negatived. In the subsequent suit, filed by the appellant to restrain the State from making recovery of the said amount, the precise case of the appellant again was that the order of recovery was vitiated on the ground that no hearing had been granted to him before the amount was certified as due from him. Thus, it is apparent that the matter directly and substantially in issue in the suit had been directly and substantially in issue in the earlier writ petition, which was heard and decided by this Court. 6. That a decision in the writ petition operates as res judicata in a subsequent civil suit inter partes, if the cause of action is the same, is now well settled by the Supreme Court in AI ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... If a decision on question of law applicable to the given facts has attained finality it will operate as res judicata even if the question was interpreted in ignorance of a binding precedent or if in a subsequent binding precedent the law has been interpreted otherwise. Therefore the subsequent declaration of the Supreme Court in a different proceeding (on the same cause of action) as to requisite compliance with and mandatory nature of Article 299(1) does not affect the operation of the earlier decision of the L. P. A. as res judicata in a subsequent suit on the same cause of action. 10. From a review of the aforesaid judgment it stands established that in any case in which it is found that the matter directly and substantially in issue had been directly and substantially in issue in a former suit or writ petition and has been heard and finally decided by a competent Court principles of res judicata cannot be ignored. Even an erroneous judgment is nonetheless a binding judgment inter partes, so long as it is not reviewed or reversed by a higher court. Once a final judgment has been obtained, the same matter cannot be canvassed anew in another action. This is the core of ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... titution of India enacts that the law declared by the Supreme Court shall be binding on all courts within the territory of India. But the plain implication of the article is that when the Supreme Court expresses its view on a particular point of law, that view would be binding on all courts in India, irrespective of any contrary view expressed by any other court earlier and after the declaration by the Supreme Court, the view expressed to the contrary would no longer be treated as good law. It, however, does not mean that the effect of the decision, which had taken a contrary view and had become final between them stands automatically wiped off. The effect of a judgment, inter partes, can only be wiped off by getting that particular judgment reversed in an appeal or review. To hold otherwise would offend against the principle of finality of judgments. Moreover, Mr. Thakur is not correct in assuming that the declaration of law by the Supreme Court amounts to an 'alteration' in law so as to exclude the application of the rule of res judicata. Article 141 of the Constitution has a limited purpose and does not confer any legislative functions on the Supreme Court. The ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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