Winding-up jurisdiction is limited: contractual claims against third parties cannot be enforced by summary order outside the Companies Act scheme.

Section 188 of the Indian Companies Act, 1913 was construed as permitting, in appropriate liquidation cases, payment into the bank instead of payment to the liquidator, but not as creating a fresh jurisdiction to adjudicate contractual claims against third parties outside the statutory recovery scheme. Read with Section 185 and the winding-up framework, the summary powers of the Company Court were limited to persons expressly brought within the Act, such as contributories or others covered by the recovery machinery. A mere contracting party with the liquidator could not be proceeded against by summary order in liquidation, and any such claim had to be pursued by ordinary suit.

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Issues: Whether the Company Court had jurisdiction under Section 188 of the Indian Companies Act, 1913 to direct a person, who was neither a contributory nor otherwise within Section 185, to deposit money due under a contract with the liquidator and to enforce that direction as a simple money decree.

Analysis: Section 188 was construed as enabling the Court, in appropriate cases, to substitute payment into the bank for payment to the liquidator, but not as conferring a new jurisdiction to adjudicate and enforce claims against third parties outside the classes dealt with by the Act. The opening words of the section were read in light of the scheme of liquidation and Section 185, which deals with persons from whom money is recoverable by summary process. The Court held that the appellants, being mere contracting parties with the liquidator and not contributories or persons falling within the statutory recovery machinery, could not be proceeded against summarily in the winding-up proceedings. Claims of that kind had to be pursued by ordinary suit.

Conclusion: The Company Court had no jurisdiction to make the impugned summary order against the appellants, and the order was without jurisdiction.

Final Conclusion: The appeal succeeded, the summary recovery order was set aside, and the liquidator was left to pursue the claim in the regular manner if so advised.

Ratio Decidendi: The winding-up court's summary powers cannot be extended beyond the classes and liabilities expressly provided by the Companies Act, and a contractual claim against a third party outside that scheme must be enforced by regular suit, not by a decree-like order in liquidation.

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