2.1.1 Filing the Complaint Paper
The plaint (mudda) opens the case: the plaintiff's claims, facts, grounds, and relief sought — the framing rules (one claim or connected claims; the court-fees' payment; the cause-of-action's statement; the jurisdiction's averment). Registration, numbering, and the first date's fixation. Defective plaints: return for cure; amendment's discipline (before issues, liberally; after, with conditions).
2.1.2 Notice to Defendant and Furnishing of Notice (Process, Summons, Subpoena, Application for Time Extension)
Process/summons — the court's command to the defendant to appear and answer (service modes: personal, substituted — affixture, publication — where the defendant evades; service through local administration); subpoena — the witness-summons to attend and testify. The defendant may seek time extension for the answer (the first of the case's many adjournment decisions — 2.1.8). Proper service is the trial's foundation: no notice, no fair trial (the ex-parte discipline — Unit 4.2).
2.1.3 Filing the Defense
The written statement (jawab): the paragraph-wise traverse of the plaint — denials, admissions, new facts, defences (limitation, res judicata — the bars), set-off and counter-claims (the defendant's own claims against the plaintiff). The reply-and-rejoinder cycle closes the pleadings; the court then frames the issues (the dispute's questions, fact and law).
2.1.4 Power of Attorney
The wakalatnama: the litigant's authorisation of counsel (and of a mukhtiyar — the case's manager-agent) to act, appear, admit, compromise and receive — within the limits the document sets (the agency law of Contract-II, this semester, Unit 4). The court's registration of appearance; the counsel's duties and discipline (the Bar Council's conduct rules); the special vs. general power's divides (compromise and receipt powers must be expressly conferred).
2.1.5 Statement of Witness and the Parties
The parties' own statements (the bayan — the court's questioning of plaintiff and defendant on the issues) and the witnesses' examination: examination-in-chief, cross-examination, re- examination — through the court's questioning discipline (the judge-led examination of Nepali
practice, with counsel's questions put through the bench); the oath; the deposition's record; the witness's protections (attendance enforcement, penalties for default).
2.1.6 Court's Order
2.1.6.1 Internal, Interlocutory and Interim Order. (i) Internal orders — the bench's administrative directions (dates, registers, office corrections) — the case's plumbing; (ii) interlocutory orders — rulings within the case before judgment (on pleadings, evidence admissibility, issues, costs) — appealable only with the final judgment unless they finally determine a right; (iii) interim orders — the before-judgment protections: status quo, injunctions (restraining the defendant from defeating the claim), attachment before judgment, the appointment of receivers, security demands — discretionary, protective, reviewable (the same family as the writ court's stay orders — Unit 4.6.2).
2.1.7 Collection and Evaluation of Evidence
The burden of proof (he who asserts proves — the Evidence Act's discipline with the Civil Code's general principles), documentary evidence (production, exhibition, admission/denial, proof of private documents, certified copies of public ones), ocular evidence (the witness ladder of 2.1.5), local inspection (sthal-bharai — the court's own eye on the property or scene), the expert evidence (commissioners, surveyors, handwriting), and the evaluation rules — preponderance of probability (the civil standard), the court's reasoned weighing, and the requirement that judgments rest only on record-evidence (the natural-justice and evidence-law floor).
2.1.8 Postponement of Dates
The adjournment system (tarikh dilaune): grounds (absence, illness, counsel's engagement, evidence's un-readiness), the court's discretion and its costs-discipline — the delay's engine when unpoliced (the case-life statistics' shame); the law's counters: costs, the court's power to proceed ex-parte, the continuous-hearing reforms (Procedural Law-I, Semester 4, Unit 5's recent practices).
2.1.9 Withdrawal and Compromise on Civil Cases
Withdrawal — the plaintiff's retreat: unconditionally (a fresh suit's freedom) or with liberty to re- file (on limitation's terms); the court's permission where the defendant has counter-claimed. Compromise — the settlement's entry: by the parties' agreement (at any stage, including through mediation — the court's referral to the mediation centre under the Mediation Act 2068's discipline — Procedural Law-I, Unit 4), recorded and decreed — the settlement becomes a decree with execution's full force (Unit 5).
2.1.10 Judgement
The civil case's end: the judgment — the reasoned decision on each issue, the evidence's evaluation, the law's application, and the decree (the operative command: pay, deliver, partition, restrain, declare). The essentials: issues answered, reasons given, rights adjudged; pronounced in open court; the jirat (the partition's detail in property cases); costs' allocation; and the appeal's seed — the judgment's execution (Unit 5) or appeal (Unit 4).