Vested right of appeal survives constitutional change unless taken away expressly or by necessary implication.

A right of appeal in civil litigation is a substantive vested right that accrues when the suit is instituted and continues through the ordinary appellate hierarchy unless a later law removes it expressly or by necessary intendment. In pre-Constitution suits, constitutional appellate provisions were construed to preserve rather than destroy that accrued right. Article 133 was treated as prospective and not as cutting off pre-existing appeals, while Article 135 preserved the corresponding appellate jurisdiction where the earlier right survived. The analysis therefore supports preservation of vested appellate rights in pending or pre-Constitution matters.

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Issues: (i) Whether a litigant acquires a vested right of appeal on the institution of a suit and whether that right survives subsequent constitutional changes unless taken away expressly or by necessary intendment. (ii) Whether the appeal from a High Court judgment in a suit instituted before the Constitution is governed by Article 135 of the Constitution of India or falls within Article 133 of the Constitution of India.

Issue (i): Whether a litigant acquires a vested right of appeal on the institution of a suit and whether that right survives subsequent constitutional changes unless taken away expressly or by necessary intendment.

Analysis: The controlling principle is that the right of appeal is a substantive right and not a mere matter of procedure. The right attaches to the institution of the original proceeding and is governed by the law then in force. It continues through the ordinary appellate hierarchy and can be displaced only by a later enactment that does so expressly or by necessary intendment. The Constitution, read with the continuing existing law and the adaptation order, did not evince an intention to destroy vested appellate rights merely because the appellate forum was reconstituted.

Conclusion: The litigant had a vested right of appeal arising on the institution of the suit, and that right was not taken away by implication.

Issue (ii): Whether the appeal from a High Court judgment in a suit instituted before the Constitution is governed by Article 135 of the Constitution of India or falls within Article 133 of the Constitution of India.

Analysis: Article 133 was construed as prospective and as not intended to strip pre-existing appellate rights in suits instituted before the Constitution. A construction that confines Article 133 to proceedings instituted after the Constitution would preserve the accrued right of appeal in pre-Constitution suits and avoid unintended retrospective deprivation. As the Federal Court had jurisdiction immediately before the Constitution in respect of such vested appeals, Article 135 preserved the corresponding jurisdiction of the Supreme Court in matters not properly governed by Article 133. On the facts, the suit value and the reversal decree brought the case within the pre-existing appellate right, and the refusal of leave by the High Court was erroneous.

Conclusion: The appeal was not excluded by Article 133 and was supportable under Article 135; special leave was therefore warranted.

Final Conclusion: The decision recognises the preservation of pre-Constitution vested appellate rights and holds that constitutional appellate provisions must be construed so as not to destroy those rights except by clear language or necessary implication.

Ratio Decidendi: A right of appeal in civil litigation is a vested substantive right accruing at the institution of the suit, and unless a later law expressly or by necessary intendment takes it away, that right continues and may be enforced under the constitutional provision preserving the pre-existing appellate jurisdiction.

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