Shearer, J.This is an appeal against an order of the Subordinate Judge, Third Court, Patna, declining to entertain objections taken by certain judgment-debtors in proceedings in execution of a decree for the payment of money. In execution of this decree, certain property was attached and was later sold on 12th April 1940. For reasons which do not appear, and which are not material, the sale was not confirmed until 2nd June 1941. On 27th May 1941, that is five days before the sale was confirmed, these judgment-debtors complained, in the first place, that, as they were agriculturists, a house which had been attached was not liable to be sold by reason of the provisions contained in Section 60(1)(c), Civil P.C.; and, in the second, that, as they were agricultural debtors, the Court executing the decree should u/s 15, Bihar Money-Lenders Act, have exempted from sale a portion at least of the land which had been attached. The learned Subordinate Judge dismissed these objections summarily on the ground that they could and ought to have been made long before they were.

2. It is now conceded that, in consequence of a notification which has been issued by the Government of Bihar under Sub-section (2) of Section 15, Bihar Money-Lenders Act, there is no substance in the second of the two objections which were raised. It is however contended that the learned Subordinate Judge ought to have given the judgment-debtors an opportunity of showing that they were in fact agriculturists, and it is asked that a remand should now be ordered for this purpose. The application was in effect and, indeed in terms, an application to set aside the sale which had taken place on 12th April 1940, so far as a portion of the property which was then sold was concerned. That being so the application ought to have been made within thirty days of 12th April 1940, and, as it was not made until very much later, the learned Subordinate Judge would appear to have been correct in declining to entertain it.

3. The learned advocate for the appellants in contending otherwise has relied mainly on the the decision in Ram Chandar v. Sarupa AIR 1939 Lah. 113. At first sight, the circumstances in that case would appear to be analogous to those with which we have to deal here, inasmuch as the judgment-debtors there complained that they were agriculturists and that their residential house ought not to have been attached and sold, and the application to have the sale set aside was made after the sale and before its confirmation. The view taken in that case was that the question as to whether or not the property should have been sold was a question arising u/s 47, Civil P.C., and, as the Court executing the decree was not yet functus officio at the time the question was raised it ought to have decided it. When however the facts are examined more closely, it is clear that this ease stands on a very different footing. For one thing, the question which the Lahore High Court had to consider was whether or not the Court executing the decree had been correct in the view which it had taken, that any objection that the property was not liable to sale ought to have been taken before the sale actually took place and could not be taken after it.

4. For another thing, the sale in that particular case took place on 24th September 1986, and the application to have the sale set aside was made on 6th October 1936, that is, within the period of limitation prescribed by Article 166, Limitation Act In other words, the Lahore High Court was not at all called upon to consider the applicability of that article. It may be that the question that arises here, as much as the question that arose in the Lahore case, was a question falling within the purview of Section 47, Civil P.C.; but quite clearly, it was also an application to have a sale set aside, and that being so, Article 166, Limitation Act, was necessarily applicable.

5. The learned advocate for the appellants also referred to certain observations made by their Lordships of the Judicial Committee in Ganapathy Mudaliar v. Krishnamachariar AIR. 1917 PC 121. In that case an error was made in drawing up a mortgage decree, and in consequence of this error, some considerable time after the decree had been put into execution, and the mortgaged property had been sold, the mortgagors or some of them instituted a suit, asserting that they were still entitled to redeem the mortgage. This suit was dismissed, and, in upholding the order dismissing it, their Lordships observed that, if the point had been raised by the judgment-debtors in the execution proceedings before the sale was confirmed, the question as to whether or not they were still entitled to redeem would have had to be considered. The decision and the observations made have clearly no application whatever to the facts of the present case. The learned advocate for the appellants finally contended that even if Article 166, Limitation Act, was applicable, there was nothing on the record to show that his clients had had knowledge of the sale within more than thirty days before 27th May 1941, when they raised the objection. If, however, this were correct, the application to have the sale set aside ought to have contained a statement as to the date on which the judgment-debtors came to know of the sale. After the sale, there was protracted litigation, in consequence of which the sale was not confirmed for more than 12 months. It is scarcely possible in these circumstances to believe that the judgment-debtors or any of them were not in fact aware long before 27th May 1941, that this particular property had been sold. Moreover, from the order of the learned Subordinate Judge it appears that he asked what the reasons were for the in-ordinate delay in the making of the application and obtained no satisfactory reply.

6. There is, in my view, no substance in the appeal and I would accordingly dismiss it with costs.

Meredith, J.

I agree.