With an goal to unexpectedly solve instances which might be caught on the cross-exam degrees withinside the civil courts throughout the country, the Law Commission of India has encouraged to the Centre a minor modification withinside the Code of Civil Procedure to cast off an anomaly.

In its recommendation, the Commission headed with the aid of using retired Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi talked about that the word `plaintiff`s witness` desires to get replaced with the `defendant`s witness` in Rule 14(4) of Order VII of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908.
In a civil dispute, the plaintiff is someone who documents a case in courtroom docket whilst the defendant is the only towards whom the case is filed.

At present, due to the ambiguity, many instances which might be scheduled for cross-exam or for manufacturing of recent files as stipulated withinside the Act couldn’t be proceeded with due to the objections raised with the aid of using both party.

The 18-web page file, that’s the primary file with the aid of using the twenty second Law Commission, titled “Urgent want to Amend Rule 14 (4) of Order VII of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908” turned into submitted to the authorities in advance this week. The file stated, “The phrases plaintiff`s witnesses referred to in sub-rule (4) of Rule 14 of Order VII require to be corrected as defendant`s witnesses.”

A plaintiff cannot, besides as supplied in Section 154 of the Evidence Act, placed questions that is probably installed cross-exam to his very own witnesses.

“Sub-rule (3) of Rule 1 of Order XIII additionally makes the location clean whilst the expression “cross- exam of the witness of the alternative party” is hired therein. Therefore, the ambiguity in sub-rule (4) of Rule 14 of Order VII is evident,” it stated.

The Law Commission stated that in spite of the Supreme Court in its 2005 judgment stating the ambiguity and recommending to the Centre to make modifications withinside the law, it has remained unchanged so far.

Justice Awasthi in a letter addressed to the Minister of Law and Justice, Kiren Rijiju, stated whilst withinside the absence of any corrective degree undertaken with the aid of using Parliament, the path issued with the aid of using the Supreme Court holds the field.