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Applications A.Nos.4782 and 4835 of 2009 are for the grant of prohibitory orders, to restrain the second respondent-Garnishee from making payment of the amounts due from them to the first respondent. The other 2 applications A.Nos.6316 and 6317 of 2009 are by the Axis Bank to implead them as parties to the Garnishee applications.

2. Though the Garnishee applications are by different companies, the relief sought for by them, is against the very same respondents, on identical causes of action. The grounds on which relief is sought by the applicants and the grounds on which the applications are contested by the respondents, are common. Therefore the applications are taken up together and disposed of by this common order.

12. Some of the captive consumers, apart from obtaining interim orders of injunction, also filed separate applications in A.Nos.3893 of 2009, 3434 of 2009, 3562 of 2009 and 3561 of 2009, seeking prohibitory orders against the garnishee viz., the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board, restraining them from making payments of their dues to the first respondent. In those applications, interim prohibitory orders were originally granted. A similar application for a prohibitory order was filed in A.No.3924 of 2009 by the applicant in A.No. 4782 of 2009. In that application also, a pro-order was granted against the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board. But after service of notice, the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board reported to this Court that no money is payable by them to the first respondent. Therefore, the garnishee applications of other captive consumers were dismissed on the short ground that Tamilnadu Electricity Board did not owe any money to the first respondent herein. However, upon enquiry, it was found out that the first respondent was routing its supply through the second respondent herein and hence it was the second respondent who was liable to make payments to the first respondent.

55. The above stand taken by the second respondent is stated, only to be rejected, for the following reasons:-

(i) The very agreement that the second respondent has entered into with the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board on 21.10.2009, is obviously with a view to complicate matters and help the first respondent to get away with the breach of the Power Supply Agreements entered into by the first respondent with the captive consumers like the applicants. The applicants as well as many other captive consumers have already obtained interim orders of injunction against the first respondent and those orders have also been confirmed by the Division Bench. Some of the captive consumers obtained Garnishee orders against the Electricity Board in the first instance, but those orders were vacated after the Electricity Board reported that they do not owe any money to the first respondent. The Electricity Board had entered into the agreement dated 21.10.2009, only after being a party to those Garnishee applications. Therefore, the second respondent cannot take refuge under their agreement with Tamil Nadu Electricity Board.
(ii) The applications on hand are only Garnishee applications. The role of the second respondent, as a Garnishee, is very very limited. All that they can be heard in these applications to say, is whether they owe any money to the first respondent or not. The matter ends there in so far as Garnishees are concerned.
(iii) The second respondent-Garnishee need not fear that as a consequence of non-payment to the first respondent, they would stop power supply. The first respondent was already duty bound to stop power supply to the second respondent, on account of the interim orders of injunction granted in previous applications under Section 9, which have also been confirmed by the Division Bench. Therefore no new consequence would flow out of a Garnishee order, when the first respondent has no inclination to stop supply to the second respondent even on the basis of interim orders of injunction.