Burn, J.

This is an appeal from the order of the learned District Judge of West Godawari dismissing a creditors petition under S. 9 of the Provincial Insolvency Act to adjudicate the respondent as insolvent. The facts are not in dispute. The respondent executed on the 20th of December 1935 a promissory note for Rs. 900, in favour of the appellants. On the 9th of October 1936 the appellants presented the petition in insolvency against the respondent alleging three acts of insolvency which had occurred within three months before that date. The learned District Judge dismissed the insolvency petition on a preliminary point holding that the petition was not maintainable because the petitioning creditors constitute a firm and have not registered themselves. The learned District Judge relies upon S. 69 of the Indian Partnership Act, IX of 193

2. By S. 69(2) it is provided that no suit to enforce a right arising from a contract shall be instituted in any Court by or on behalf of a firm against any third party unless the firm is registered and the persons suing are or have been shown in the Register of Firms as partners in the firm. By Sub-S. 3 the provisions of Sub-Ss. 1 and 2 shall apply also to a claim of set off or other proceedings to enforce a right arising from a contract. The learned District Judge has held that this insolvency petition is in reality a proceeding to enforce a right arising from a contract. We are unable to agree with the learned District Judge on this point. A petition for the adjudication of a debtor as an insolvent is not in our view a proceeding to enforce a right arising from a contract. It is no doubt the case that the creditors who apply for the adjudication of their debtors as insolvents hope to recover the whole or some portion of their debt in the distribution of the assets of the insolvents estate, but it cannot be said, we think, that the proceedings in insolvency are proceedings to enforce the rights of the creditors arising from the contracts between them and their debtors. The right which the creditor who files the insolvency petition against his debtor is seeking to exercise is the right of a creditor who finds his debtor in insolvent circumstances to have the assets of the debtor administered in insolvency and distributed for the benefit of the creditors as a body. This is a right which is conferred upon the creditors by statute and is not a right arising out of a particular contract of loan between a petitioning creditor and a debtor. The learned Counsel for the respondent has sought to support the order of the learned District Judge by contending that the debt due to the petitioning creditors in this case should be considered to be not legally recoverable. He refers us to Halsburys Laws of England, Volume II, page 59, where it is laid down that a debt which can support an insolvency petition must be a legally recoverable debt and that debts which are time-barred cannot be the foundation of an insolvency petition. We do not think there is any real analogy between these two cases. The debt due from the respondent to the petitioners in this case is legally recoverable. In the language of S. 9 of the Provincial Insolvency Act it is a debt owing to the petitioners and it exceeds Rs. 500. The mere fact that the petitioners constitute a firm and this debt is due to the firm in which the petitioners are partners and they cannot file a suit to recover the amount due to them unless the firm is registered does not deprive the petitioners of their right to file a petition in insolvency.

For these reasons we set aside the order of the learned District Judge and direct that the insolvency petition be restored to file and disposed of according to law. The appellants will recover their costs of this appeal from the respondent. In the event of the respondent being adjudicated insolvent the costs will be a first charge upon the estate in the hands of the receiver.