Arjun Singh v Mohindra Kumar

• Three connected suits were consolidated for hearing and a day was fixed for judgment. The appellant did not appear and ex parte orders were passed. His application, purporting to be under O.IX R.7, to set aside the ex parte orders was rejected, and so was his revision. He then applied under O.IX R.13 on the same facts, and the courts below held this barred by res judicata.

1. Whether the rejection of the O.IX R.7 application barred the later application under O.IX R.13, and whether the court had inherent power under S.151 to entertain the first application.

• There is no material difference between good cause under O.IX R.3 and sufficient cause under O.IX R.13. Res judicata may apply to different stages of the same suit, but an interlocutory order under O.IX R.7 is not of a kind that bars a hearing on the merits of an application under O.IX R.13. Since the hearing was over and only judgment remained, R.7 did not apply and the first application was incompetent. The inherent power of the court cannot override the express or implied provisions of law; O.IX R.7 and R.13 provide for every contingency of the defendant's absence, so there was no scope for S.151.

Where the Code deals with a matter and, expressly or by necessary implication, exhausts the court's powers on it, the inherent power under S.151 cannot be used to cut across those provisions. O.IX R.7 and R.13 together cover every situation arising from the defendant's absence, so S.151 has no role there. An interlocutory order under O.IX R.7 does not bar a hearing on the merits of a later application under O.IX R.13.