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8. Both the arguments based on the Press Communique must, therefore, fail.

9. The other contention of the appellant was that the liability to pay him compensation for his lands was a liability in respect of a financial obligation of the Governor-General-in-Council, outstanding immediately before 14-8-1947 and that, therefore, under the provisions of Article 9 (a) of the Rights, Property and Liabilities Order, 1947, it came to be a liability of the Dominion of India and had since become a liability of the Indian Union. The respondent's contention is that this matter is concluded by authority. According to a large body of decisions, a non-contractual liability and particularly a liability for compensation in respect of lands acquired under the Defence of India Rules, is not a financial obligation, as contemplated by Article 9 (a) of the Order, but it is a "liability in respect of an actionable wrong other than breach of contract", as contemplated by the residuary Article 10. The respondent, the Union of India, accordingly, contends that the appellant's contention is not only unsound in itself, but that in view of the uniform current decisions, it cannot also reopen the question to any purpose,

11. In all these cases, certain principles have been laid clown. It has been held that the expression "financial obligations" in Article 9 (a) of the Order is to be "ejusdem generis' with the words "loans and guarantees" preceding it. The result of so construing the expression has been held to be that it must be taken as limited to obligations of a contractual character and, secondly, to such obligations relating to State finance. The Rights, Property and Liabilities Order which provides for the initial distribution of rights, property and liabilities consequential on the setting up of Dominions of India and Pakistan, has been held to be exhaustive and to provide for a distribution of all rights, all property and all liabilities. The various Articles of the Order are, therefore, to be construed in such manner that room can be found in one or other of them for each right, each property and each liability. It has next been held that leaving aside Arts. 4 and 5 which deal with land, Article 6 which deals with goods, coins, bank notes and currency notes and Article 7 which deals with property of other kinds, subject to the provisions next following relating to contractual rights, Arty. 8 and 9 are both concerned with contracts--Article 8 providing for contractual rights and liabilities in general and Article 9 providing for contractual liabilities of certain special kinds. The whole area of contracts and contractual rights and liabilities is thus covered by those two Articles. Last comes the residuary Article 10 which provides for liabilities other than those arising from a breach of contract and described as liabilities "in respect of an actionable wrong." A liability which is not a contractual liability and which has no relationship to public finance has thus been held not to be a financial obligation within the meaning of Article 9, but to be a liability in respect of an actionable wrong, other than breach of contract, within the meaning of Article 10.

14. Equally do I feel some difficulty about Article 10 (1). Its language, inter alia, is: "Where immediately before the appointed day, the Governor-General in Council is subject to any liability in respect of an actionable wrong other than breach of contract." That language seems to me to presuppose that before the appointed day, something has been done which is wrong, that the wrong is actionable and that a liability has accrued as a consequence of that wrong. Sen, J., in his dissenting opinion observed that in a case of requisition, and acquisition under the Defence of India Rules, the requisition itself could not amount to an actionable wrong, because it was a requisition in accordance with law and under the authority of a statute. Section 299(2) of the Government of India Act, 1935, undoubtedly provided that no Legislature would be entitled to make any law authorising the compulsory acquisition for public purposes of any land, unless the law provided for the payment of compensation for the property acquired. But the Defence o India Rules did provide for payment of compensation and, therefore, compulsory acquisition of land for public purposes under the Defence of India Rules could not in itself be an actionable wrong. As against that view, it has been said that the actionable wrong in such a case would not be the requisition itself, but refusal to pay compensation or delay in paying it, where such refusal or delay occurred. With respect, I feel some difficulty in accepting that meaning of actionable wrong' in the context of such facts, because the words "is subject to any liability in respect of an actionable wrong" seem to me to imply that the liability is created by the wrong or is a consequence of it. If refusal to pay or delay in paying compensation is an actionable wrong, the liability to pay the compensation is not created by such refusal or delay, but it exists otherwise and has arisen out of the act of the acquisition itself. Another difficulty also strikes me. If refusal to pay or delay in paying is the actionable wrong and the liability is a liability in respect thereof, no liability can arise till there has been refusal or delay. To take then a case where a requisition was made one or two weeks or say a month prior to the Appointed Day and no refusal to pay compensation or delay made in paying it had occurred, it is clear that the obligation to pay compensation for the property, so acquired, would not come under Article 10 (1), but I do not see under which other Aiticle it could come, if it did not also come under Article 9 (a). Mr. Roy, who appear on behalf of the Union of India, said that, in such a case, there would be no difficulty at all, because the actionable wrong, if any, would arise only when any refusal or delay occurred, which would be after the Appointed Day and, consequently, such a case would be outside the ambit of the Order altogether. This view, although it appears to be plausible at eight, seems to me to run counter to the view that the Rights, Property and Liabilities Order makes provision for all rights and liabilities which were in existence immediately before the Appointed Day. In the hypothetical case which I have taken, an obligation to pay compensation for the property acquired undoubtedly had arisen and was outstanding immediately before the Appointed Day, but if it could not come under Article 9 (a), not being a contractual obligation and could not also come under Article 10, there being no actionable wrong yet, it would be quite impossible to find any place for it, although its existence could not possibly be denied.

21. With regard to the interpretation of the expression "liability in respect of an actionable wrong," occurring in Article 10, my opinion is that this liability is a liability arising from refusal or delay in making payment, as has been pointed out by my Lord the Chief Justice. But I think that this liability is simultaneous with the delay or refusal in making payment. In the case before us there was a delay of many years in making payment of compensation to the appellant. It is, However, possible to conceive of a case where there was no delay in making payment of compensation, for example, in a case where the acquisition was made within one week before the Appointed Day. In Such a case I would accept the contention of Mr. Roy that such a case would fall outside the purview of the Indian Independence (Rights, Property and Liabilities) Order. "Actionable wrong" no doubt means a wrong in "respect of which an action lies, but liability in respect of actionable wrong accrues as soon as the wrong has taken place. So in this case I have no doubt in my mind that the case clearly comes under Article 10 of the Indian Independence (Rights, Property and Liabilities) Order.