Harington, J.:— This is a Rule to set aside a judgment given against the East Indian Railway Company on the ground, amongst others, that no claim was served on the Company under the provisions of sec. 77 of the Indian Railways Act. That section provides that a claim such as the present claim which is made in respect of goods which are delivered in a damaged condition shall not be enforced unless it is made in writing to the railway administration within six months from the date of the delivery of the goods. Now sec. 140 provides how that claim is to be served and enacts that any document required or authorized by this Act to be served on a railway administration may be served, in the case of a railway administered by the Government, on the manager, and in the case of a railway administered by a Railway Company, on the Agent in India of the Railway Company; and then it goes on, in the sub-clauses, to describe how that claim is to be served which it is unnecessary to deal with in this case. The complaint made by the Railway Company in the present case is that the judgment of the lower Court cannot stand because the sections of the Railways Act to which I have referred have not been complied with. The claim in question was served within six months but it was served on the Divisional Traffic Manager and the learned Vakil for the Opposite Party argues that is a sufficient compliance with the provisions of the Act. It is quite clear to me that it is not so. There is a direct authority contrary to the view taken by the learned Vakil which is to be found in the case of Nadiar Chand Saha v. Wood, anil that case laid down that the notice must be served as provided by sec. 140 and that the service on the Traffic Manager in the case of a railway administered by the Railway Company instead of on the Agent is not a service within the Act. It is perfectly clear to my mind that decision is a perfectly correct one. On the other hand, reliance has been placed by the learned Vakil on the case of Woods, Agent to the Assam Bengal Railway v. Meher Alt Bepari. If that case purported to lay down as a matter of law that a service on the Traffic Manager was a sufficient compliance with the Act, and was a good service as on the Agent, I shall not be prepared to agree with it. But the decision appears to have gone on the finding come to on the particular facts of that case that the Agent had authorized the Traffic Manager to receive the notice; at least, that is the fact, as I follow the judgment. The result is that, in my opinion, this Rule ought to be made absolute on the very short ground that the Plaintiff in the action did not comply with the condition precedent to his suit which is found in sec. 77 of the Railways Act by not serving the claim as provided by sec. 140 of that Act. On this ground, the Rule is made absolute with costs, the hearing-fee being assessed at one gold mohur.
Carndoff, J.:— I agree.
Rule made absolute.