Executing court cannot decide benami decree-holder claims; such disputes must be taken to a regular suit.

In execution proceedings, the executing court must proceed on the decree as drawn and cannot investigate a benami claim by treating someone not named in the decree as the real decree-holder. A person merely asserting beneficial ownership of the decree has no locus standi to execute it in his own name unless he is the named decree-holder, an assignee, or a legal representative. Although Section 47(3) of the Code of Civil Procedure can cover disputes between rival claimants to the decree-holder's position, it does not authorise the executing court to go behind the decree and determine a benami controversy. Such issues must be pursued in a regular suit; the appellate court set aside the contrary orders.

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Issues: Whether, in execution proceedings, the executing court can decide a claim that the ostensible decree-holder is only a benamidar and that another person is the real decree-holder, and whether such a controversy falls within the scope of Section 47(3) of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908.

Analysis: A decree may be executed only by the person named in the decree as decree-holder, by an assignee of the decree, or by the legal representative of the decree-holder. A person who merely claims to be the real beneficiary of a benami decree does not fall within those categories and has no locus standi in execution to assert a right to execute in his own name. Section 47(3) is wide enough to cover disputes between rival claimants to the position of decree-holder, but the executing court is not required to investigate a benami controversy that would require it to go behind the decree and determine who is ly entitled to its fruits. Such questions are more appropriately decided in a regular suit, especially in light of the policy reflected in provisions discouraging benami arrangements.

Conclusion: The executing court had no jurisdiction to decide the benami dispute or to deny substitution of the deceased decree-holder's legal representative on that basis.

Final Conclusion: The appeal succeeded, and the orders of the courts below were set aside with costs.

Ratio Decidendi: In execution, the court must take the decree as it stands and cannot adjudicate a benami claim by treating a person not named in the decree as the real decree-holder; such a claim must be pursued in a regular suit.

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