Executing court cannot disregard a clear decree on personal liability unless the decree is a nullity or patently without jurisdiction.

An executing court cannot go behind a clear decree to deny execution against the judgment-debtors' personal properties merely on the asserted ground that they were not personally liable. Where the decree expressly fastens liability and the plea of non-personal liability has already been considered and rejected, that controversy cannot be reopened in execution. Only a decree that is a nullity or patently without jurisdiction on the face of the record can be ignored. The court therefore held that the decree remained binding, the judgment-debtors were personally liable, and their properties could be proceeded against.

---

---

Issues: Whether the executing court could refuse execution against the personal properties of the judgment-debtors on the ground that they were not personally liable under the decree, and whether the decree was a nullity so as to permit the executing court to go behind it.

Analysis: The decree expressly made the defendants liable and the trial court had already considered and rejected the plea that the second and third defendants were not personally liable. An earlier attempt to correct the judgment and decree under sections 151 and 152 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 was rejected on the footing that the personal liability was the result of judicial reasoning and not an accidental slip. The Court distinguished cases where a decree is a nullity or where lack of jurisdiction appears on the face of the record, and held that the present dispute involved questions of law and fact relating to personal liability. Such a controversy could not be reopened in execution proceedings, and the executing court was bound by the decree.

Conclusion: The executing court could not ignore the decree or treat it as a nullity, and the judgment-debtors remained personally liable; their properties were liable to be proceeded against.

Ratio Decidendi: An executing court cannot go behind a clear decree on the ground of alleged absence of personal liability unless the decree is a nullity or patently without jurisdiction on the face of the record.

---