Bombay High Court
Balkrishna Bhalchandra vs Gopal Raghunath on 15 December, 1875
Equivalent citations: (1877)ILR 1BOM73
JUDGMENT West, J.
1. The District Court has confirmed the order of the Subordinate Judge, limiting the amount, recoverable as interest by the judgment-creditor, to a sum equal to the principal sum awarded by the decree. This decision is based on the rule of the Hindu Law which limits the amount recoverable at one time by way of interest to the amount of the principal. But there is no authority for limiting the amount recoverable in execution of a decree by any such rule. As regards purely private transactions, the law for the protection of the weaker party controls his freedom of contract in the way to which we have referred, or, at least, refuses to enforce the debtor's engagement by means of a duty imposed on the Courts of exercising their powers of coercion to give effect to what it presumes to be an extortionate or unduly rigorous bargain. But the same reason, it is obvious, does not apply to the execution of a decree of a Civil Court. In making such a decree the Judge is not liable, as the debtor is supposed to be, to undue pressure on the part of the creditor. If public policy requires any limitation of the amount of interest to be recovered, this can be provided for in the decree itself. So long as the decree stands, it alone furnishes the standard for the extent to which execution may proceed, if sought, in the way prescribed by law. The analogy applies of Keating v. Sparrow (1 Bal. and Beat. 367) and of Peachy v. Duke of Somerset [1 Stra., 447; 2 Wh. and Tud., 979 (3rd edn.); see p. 987].
2. We must reverse the orders of the Courts below, and direct the account to be made up with simple interest on the amount of the decree and on payments necessarily or properly incurred by the judgment-creditor, and with simple interest at the same rate as that provided by the decree on each sum received by the judgment-creditor, who is to obtain an order for execution to the extent of the balance, if any, thus found due to him.