Legal Principle & Question Decided

Ruling Summary: This decision was rendered by the Lahore High Court (Honorable Mr. Justice Muhammad Sajid Mehmood Sethi), officially reported as 2026 LHC 4092. In this matter between Abdul Aziz deceased through 5 LRs and Mst Ayesha Bibi etc, the court adjudicated key questions of statutory construction, procedural regularity, and legal precedent under Pakistani law.

Core Holding: The honorable bench evaluated governing statutory provisions and judicial authorities to establish the rights of the parties, delivering the binding reasoning set out below.

Full Judgment Text & Judicial Ruling

COURT: Lahore High Court (Honorable Mr. Justice Muhammad Sajid Mehmood Sethi) DECISION DATE: 22-06-2026 CASE DETAILS: Civil Revision 6103/24 ============================================================ Stereo. H C J D A-38. JUDGMENT SHEET IN THE LAHORE HIGH COURT, LAHORE JUDICIAL DEPARTMENT Civil Revision No.6103 of 2024

Abdul Aziz (deceased) through his Legal Heirs Versus Mst. Ayesha Bibi & others

J U D G M E N T

Date of hearing: 22.06.2026. Petitioners by: M/s. Arshad Jahangir Jhoja, Iftikhar Ahmad Chohan and Habib-ur-Rehman, Advocates. Respondents by: Mr. Akbar Ali Shad , Advocate (for respondents No.1 to 4). Respondents No.5 to 8 ex parte.

MUHAMMAD SAJID MEHMOOD SETHI, J .- The petitioners, being legal heirs of Abdul Aziz (deceased), have assailed through the instant civil revision the concurrent judgments and decrees passed by the learned Courts below whereby the suit instituted by respondents No.1 and 2 for possession through specific pe rformance of an alleged agreement to sell dated 10.12.1988 was decreed. 2. Briefly stated, the respondents/plaintiffs instituted a suit for possession through specific performance on the basis of an alleged agreement to sell dated 10.12.1988 whereby Abdul Aziz was allegedly stated to have agreed to transfer the suit property in their favour. During the course of proceedings, it transpired that Abdul Aziz had already died on 06.12.1989. Thereafter, legal heirs of the deceased were impleaded and the suit ult imately culminated in a decree in favour of the respondents. The appeal preferred by the present petitioners was dismissed by the learned Additional District Judge vide judgment and decree dated 05.01.2024, hence this revision petition. 2 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 3. Learned counsel for the petitioners contends that the entire suit was void ab initio , having been instituted against a person who was admittedly deceased on the date of institution of the proceedings. He submits that a dead person possesses no juristic personality and, therefore, cannot be impleaded as a defendant. According to the learned counsel, where the sole defendant had died long before the institution of the suit, no valid lis came into existence before the Court and the subsequent impleadment of his legal heirs co uld not cure the inherent defect. He further argues that the learned Appellate Court failed to properly examine the application for additional evidence pertaining to the passport of Abdul Aziz, which allegedly established that he was outside Pakistan on th e date of execution of the disputed agreement. Learned counsel also submits that the respondents themselves admitted having had no contact with Abdul Aziz for several years, failed to establish their readiness and willingness to perform the contract, and relied upon suspicious documents allegedly executed after his death. According to him, despite these material deficiencies, the suit was decreed only because both the learned Courts below failed to appreciate the evidence in its true perspective and overloo ked the respondents’ prolonged inactivity spanning several years. In support, he has referred to Mian Muhammad Akram and others v. Muhammad Chiragh and others (PLD 2003 Lahore 804) and Akhtar Hussain v. Widow of Malik Naeem Ullah and 3 others (2017 CLC 382). 4. Conversely, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the respondents has supported the impugned judgments and decrees. He submits that the respondents had no knowledge regarding the death of Abdul Aziz at the time of institution of the suit and immedi ately upon acquiring such knowledge sought impleadment of his legal heirs. In support, he has relied upon Jagarnath Raut v. Commissioners of Buxar Municipality and others (AIR 1961 PATNA 480). 3 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 5. I have heard learned counsel for the parties at considerabl e length and have gone through the available record with their able assistance. 6. The foremost and foundational question arising in the present matter is whether a suit instituted against a person who had already died long before its institution could validly proceed in law and whether such a defect was capable of being cured through subsequent impleadment of the legal heirs. This issue goes to the very root of jurisdiction and maintainability and, therefore, merits determination at the threshold before entering into the merits of the controversy. 7. It is an admitted and incontrovertible fact emerging from the record that Abdul Aziz expired on 06.12.1989, whereas the suit was instituted on 02.09.1996, almost seven years after his demise. Thus, on the date when the plaint was presented before the learned Trial Court, the sole defendant was no longer in existence in the eyes of law. The law recognizes only living natural persons or juristic entities as persons capable of suing or being sued. A dead person pos sesses no legal personality, no civil existence, and no capacity to participate in judicial proceedings. Consequently, a suit instituted against a person who had already died before its institution is not merely affected by a procedural defect or irregularity; rather, it is fundamentally incompetent and strikes at the very foundation of the Court's jurisdiction to entertain the matter. 8. The learned Courts below proceeded on the premise that since the plaintiffs allegedly had no knowledge of Abdul Aziz's d eath at the time of filing the suit, the defect stood cured upon subsequent impleadment of his legal heirs. Such reasoning, with utmost respect, cannot be sustained. Jurisdiction cannot be created by ignorance, nor can the legal consequences flowing from a n objective fact be altered by a party's subjective lack of knowledge. Whether the plaintiffs were aware of the death or remained ignorant thereof is wholly immaterial. The determinative factor is the legal position prevailing on the date of institution of the suit. Once it stood established that the sole defendant had already died years before the filing of the suit, there remained no 4 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 defendant before the Court against whom any lis could validly commence. In such circumstances, the proceedings lacked a law ful foundation from their very inception and could not acquire legitimacy through subsequent procedural measures. The legal heirs could not be brought on record to validate proceedings which had never come into existence in the eyes of law. The defect was not curable because there was no valid suit in existence capable of being cured. Reference in this regard may be made to the principles recognized in Hafiz Brothers (Pvt.) Ltd. v. Messrs Pakistan Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation Ltd. (2001 SCMR 1), Muhammad Yar (deceased) through L.Rs. and others v. Muhammad Amin (deceased) through L.Rs. and others (2013 SCMR 464) and Ch. Muhammad Tufail Khan alias Tufaul Muhammad through Legal Representatives v. Zari Taraqiati Bank Limited through Branch Manager (PLD 2007 Lahore 180). In the case of Muhammad Yar (deceased) through L.Rs. and others supra, the Hon’ble Supreme Court has ruled as under:- “3. Heard. Attending to the first question, the legal position by now is quite settled and explicit, in that, w here a suit / lis is against only one defendant / respondent of the case, undoubtedly it shall be invalidly instituted being against a sole dead person (defendant) and shall be a nullity in the eyes of the law as a whole; it shall be a still born suit / li s; an altogether dead matter, which cannot be revived; it shall, thus not merely be a defect which can be cured, rather fatal blow to the cause. …..”

Likewise, in the case of Ch. Muhammad Tufail Khan alias Tufaul Muhammad supra, the Hon’ble Division Ben ch of this Court has observed as under:- “8. Thus, in our view, in the cases pertaining to a sole defendant, who was dead at the time of institution of the suit, the law has been correctly laid down in the latest judgment of the Lahore High Court quoted ab ove and we are constrained to hold that the suit filed against a sole defendant, who at the time of the institution of the suit was dead, was non -existent, still born and nullity. It was not merely a defect, which could be removed/cured by impleading' the legal heirs of the deceased defendant, rather such suit could not be further proceeded and has to be dismissed by the court as having never been validly 5 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 instituted. In the given situation, the only option left for the plaintiff of the case is to institute a fresh suit against the legal heirs/representatives of the deceased defendant if the cause of action survives against them and they, are the legal representatives of the deceased within the meaning of section 2(11) of C.P.C., obviously subject to all the limitations and. defences available to the -L.Rs. under the law.” 9. The legal scheme embodied in Order I Rule 10 and Order XXII C.P.C. further fortifies the above conclusion. These provisions operate where a validly instituted suit is already pending and e ither a necessary party requires addition or a party dies during the pendency of proceedings. Such provisions presuppose the existence of a competent lis and a living party at the commencement of litigation. They do not authorize resurrection of proceeding s which were void from their inception. Substitution is conceptually different from institution. It is available only where a valid proceeding already exists. Where the sole defendant had ceased to exist before the filing of the suit, there was nothing capable of continuation through substitution or amendment. The learned Courts below, therefore, fell into patent error in treating the defect as one of mere misdescription or non -joinder capable of rectification. 10. The record further reveals that a specific objection was raised through an application under Order VII Rule 11 C.P.C., wherein the death of Abdul Aziz prior to institution of the suit was expressly pleaded and supported by documentary evidence. Once the death certificate was produced and the fact of prior death stood established, it became incumbent upon the learned Trial Court to examine whether any valid cause could legally survive against a person who had no juristic existence on the date of institution of the proceedings. Unfortunately, neither the learned Trial Court nor the learned Appellate Court undertook the legal inquiry which the issue demanded. The objection was brushed aside on considerations wholly alien to the jurisdictional nature of the controversy. Such approach resulted in a mater ial 6 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 irregularity in the exercise of jurisdiction and rendered the impugned judgments legally vulnerable. 11. The aforesaid jurisdictional defect is by itself sufficient to vitiate the entire proceedings. Once it is held that no competent suit had ever come into existence in the eyes of law, the subsequent proceedings conducted therein automatically lose their legal efficacy. Strictly speaking, no further examination on merits is required. 12. Nevertheless, since extensive arguments were addressed by learned counsel for the parties on the merits of the controversy, it may be observed, albeit tentatively, that the record also discloses certain aspects which appear to have escaped proper judicial scrutiny. The petitioners consistently maintained that Abdul Aziz was not present in Pakistan on the date of the alleged agreement to sell dated 10.12.1988 and sought to substantiate the said plea through official passport entries. Likewise, questions relating to the evidentiary worth of documents allegedly executed aft er the death of Abdul Aziz, as well as the respondents' continuous readiness and willingness to perform the contract, also required deeper examination. However, in view of the conclusion already reached on the jurisdictional issue, it is neither necessary nor appropriate for this Court to record any final opinion on these aspects. 13. It is settled law that concurrent findings ordinarily command great respect in revisional jurisdiction and are not to be disturbed merely because another view may also be poss ible. The rule, however, is not absolute. Where the findings suffer from misapplication of settled legal principles, failure to determine a jurisdictional issue going to the root of the matter, or material illegality affecting the very competence of the proceedings, interference in revisional jurisdiction becomes not only permissible but imperative. 14. In the present case, the institution of the suit against Abdul Aziz, who had admittedly died nearly seven years prior to the filing of the suit, rendered th e proceedings fundamentally incompetent from their very inception. The subsequent impleadment of his legal heirs could not breathe life into proceedings which never had legal existence in the first 7 C.R. No.6103 of 2024 place. The learned Courts below, therefore, committed a pa tent error of law in treating the defect as curable and in proceeding with the adjudication of the suit on merits. 15. Consequently, this revision petition is allowed. The judgments and decrees passed by the learned Trial Court and affirmed by the learned Appellate Court are set aside . As a necessary consequence thereof, the suit instituted by the respondents/plaintiffs, having been filed against a person who had already died prior to its institution and thus being incompetent in law from its very inception , stands dismissed. There shall be no order as to costs. (Muhammad Sajid Mehmood Sethi) Judge

APPROVED FOR REPORTING

Judge *A.H.S.*

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