PROVINCE OF BALUCHISTAN Versus MUHAMMAD HASSAN

ABDUL QADEER CHAUDHARY, C.J .‑‑ Briefly the facts of the case are that a contract was awarded to respondent No.l Haji Muhammad Hassan for improvement of Quetta/Chaman Road, on 8th August, 1977. The amount of contract was Rs.8,00,000. The time limit for completion of the contract was four months. The estimated work was increased and the amount was raised to Rs.46,06,255. It is the case of the Government that contractor received the amount in four running bills. After completion of work the contractor said that he had completed the work to the estimated cost of Rs.56,62,925 as such a dispute arose between the contractor and the Department. A Technical Committee was constituted on 25‑8‑1981 and the report of Technical Committee was submitted on 1‑8‑1984 with the recommendation of recovery of Rs.3,63,007.75 to be recovered from the contractor and that there should be no fifth running bill and fourth running bill shall be treated as final.

2. The contractor submitted an application on 27‑5‑1986, to Chief Engineer B/R for the appointment of Arbitrator invoking clause 31 of the contract which reads as under:‑

"Clause 31.‑‑ If any question, difference or objection whatsoever shall arise in any way connected with or arising out of this instrument or the meaning operation of any part thereof or the rights, duties or liabilities of either party, then save in so far as the decision of any such matter is hereinbefore provided for and has been so decided every such matter including whether its decision has been otherwise provided for and/or whether it has been finally decided accordingly, or whether the contract should be terminated or has been rightly terminated and as regards the rights and obligations of the parties as the result of such termination shall be referred for arbitration to the . . of the ... and his decision shall be final and binding and where the matter involves a claim for or the payment to recovery or deduction of money only the amount, if any awarded in such arbitration shall be recoverable in respect of the matter so referred. Here insert the official designation of the officer to be appointed as arbitrator."

3. On 19‑6‑1986, Mr. Muhammad Azam Pathan respondent No.2 was appointed as arbitrator by Chief Engineer. The arbitrator gave his award on 6‑7‑1986 without summoning the parties and without giving them any notice and an amount of Rs.6,73,222.73 was awarded in favour of respondent No.l.

4. On 20‑9‑1986 the respondent No. 1 submitted an application in the Court of Civil Judge First Class under sections 14 and 17 of the Arbitration Act with the prayer that the arbitrator be called upon to file the award in Court and the judgment be pronounced according to award and decree be passed in favour of the respondent No.l and against the Province of Baluchistan. In this application Province of Baluchistan through Secretary Communication and Muhammad Azam Pathan arbitrator were impleaded as parties but the Chief Engineer was not made a party in the said proceedings. The application was registered on 27‑9‑1986 and it came for disposal before the learned Additional District Judge, Quetta. Notice was issued for appearance for respondents on 27‑10‑1986. Syed Kazim Raza Assistant in the Office of Chief Engineer appeared in Court on the said date styling himself to be the representative of Secretary C&W and continued appearing till 11‑2-1987 when an authority letter was produced by him issued in his favour by Chief Engineer and Mr. Muhammad Azam Pathan.

5. On 11‑3‑1987 the respondent No.l filed a photostat copy of the award and Syed Kazim Raza stated before the Court that they will make payment and the matter of payment is being processed.

6. On 21‑3‑1987, the Additional District Judge made the award rule of the Court. On 29‑6‑1987 the respondent No. 1 submitted an application for the execution of decree against Secretary C&W on 15‑12‑1987 when warrant of attachment of vehicle was issued.

Whereafter the Secretary and Executive Engineer B/R submitted an appeal on 23rd of December, 1987. Alongwith the appeal an application under section 5 of the Limitation Act was filed on the ground that appellant No.l has never been served with regard to arbitration Proceedings initiated by the arbitrator and he came to know only on 15‑12‑1987 when warrant of attachment of vehicle belonging to the appellants was served upon them. The appellant No.2 has neither beer joined a party in the arbitration proceedings nor before the Court of Additional District Judge. This application was contested by the respondent No.l.

7. The learned counsel for the appellants submitted his arguments and raised various pleas. When the learned counsel for the appellants was faced with difficulty about the competency of the appeal under section 39 of the Arbitration Act, apart from the fact that the same was barred by time, the appellant No.2 submitted an application on 25‑4‑1988, under section 151 that due to some technicalities the maintainability of the appeal is in doubt while the impugned order suffers from patent illegalities being bad in law, therefore, the appeal may be converted into revision. This application was contested by the respondent No.l. The respondent No.2 also filed an application that he was a formal party before the trial Court. Certain allegations have been made against him but those allegations are incorrect. The allegation of the appellants that the record was not received by them was also denied. The record was received by an official Mr. Qazi Rashid. The arbitrator had also requested the Executive Engineer for handing over the record for producing the same before this Court.

8. Before proceeding further, the question to be resolved is whether the application moved by the appellants be allowed and the appeal be treated as revision? The learned counsel for the appellants submitted that there is a jurisdictional error, therefore, the appeal may be treated as revision. The arbitrator made the award in violation of principles of natural justice, therefore, the same is void ab initio as such it would be in the interest of justice if the appeal may be converted into revision.

9. This application was opposed by the respondent. The learned counsel for respondent No.l stated that the appeal was filed by the Province of Baluchistan through the Secretary C&W and independent of question whether Executive Engineer was competent to file the appeal. The Executive Engineer was nobody, therefore, this application for treating the appeal as revision by the Executive Engineer may not be entertained. For the reasons firstly whether the appeal is competent by the two persons? And if same is competent on behalf of two persons the Secretary has not filed this application. The application contains misstatement of facts. It has not been stated as to why Secretary has not filed such application. As there is no proper application by a proper person, there is no application and request for conversion on the basis of this application cannot be made. Suo motu power may not be exercised for the reason that the application has been filed by the appellant No.2 for treating the appeal as revision The appeal was hopelessly barred by time. The contention of the appellants that they have not been served is misstatement of facts as their representative had appeared in the trial Court and made certain concessions on behalf of the appellants. The contention of the appellants that they had not been served is against facts on record.

10. The learned counsel has conceded that the Court has power to convert appeal into revision. But such conversion can be made for two‑fold reasons (i) where procedural statute provides appeal or revision but wrongly appeal or revision was filed, it can be converted into appeal or revision as the case may be. But in the present matter a complete novel case has been set up by the appellants. According to Arbitration Act no party can file appeal unless such party had filed objections under section 33 of the Arbitration Act. As the appellants have failed to raise objections such party loses right under section 39(6) of the Arbitration Act. If the request of the appellants be entertained then this Court has to make an inquiry as to why the Department did not file objection? Unless reasonable ground is shown the request may not be acceded to.

11. In the alternative it is contended by the learned counsel for the respondent No.l that if the appeal is converted into revision the scope is very limited as under Article 158 of the Limitation Act an application for setting aside an award is to be made within 30 days. The appellant came to know about the case on 1‑2‑1987, but appeal was filed on 23‑12‑1987, i.e. after a delay of about 10 months when the time of appeal is only 90 days, as such time‑barred appeal cannot be treated as revision without any explanation of 7 months and 20 days' delay.

12. Before we dilate upon the question of conversion of appeal into revision, the objection of learned counsel for respondent No. 1 regarding the examination of arbitrator by this Court may be disposed of. It is contended by him that additional evidence under Order XLI, Rule 27 cannot be recorded unless an application is moved by a party. In the present case appellants have not moved any application for recording of additional evidence.. The circumstances of the case do not warrant the exercise of such authority suo motu by the Court. We do not see any force in this contention. The additional evidence under Order XLI,. Rule 27 may be recorded by the appellate Court ' it requires any document to be produced or any witness to be examined to enable it to pronounce judgment, or for any other substantial cause, therefore, the power of appellate Court to record evidence is implicit in. the law itself provided there are sufficient reasons for recording the statement of a witness. The examination of arbitrator was necessary as it was contended by the appellants' counsel that the arbitrator had conducted the proceedings behind the back of the appellants. The occasion for exercise of this discretion is not necessarily that a party applies to adduce fresh evidence but on examining the material and the controversy raised by the parties if some inherent lacuna or defect becomes apparent. The defect may be pointed out by a party or the Court may itself find it. Further condition for invoking such authority under Order XLI, Rule 27 is that the evidence to be produced is unimpeachable. This is to be done in order to do complete justice between the parties, therefore, narrow and too restricted view of the rule of procedure as incorporated in Order XLI, Rule 27(i)(b) may not be taken; because the primary object of a Court is to do complete justice and the Courts of justice cannot be hampered by the procedural technicalities. There was a substantial cause for examination of the Arbitrator, therefore, this objection is ruled out.

13. The learned counsel for respondent No.l again contended that there are no sufficient reasons for treating the appeal as revision. He has referred to sections 33 and 39 of the Arbitration Act. He has contended that an award shall not be set aside except on one or more of the grounds mentioned in section 30 of the Arbitration Act. In the present case the appellants had not contested the award. They did not make any application for setting aside the award. The respondent No.l submitted an application for making the award rule of the Court. Proper notices were served upon the appellants but in spite of service they did not file any objection. On 18‑2‑1987 the representative of the Department had submitted that he did not want to file any objection. On 11‑3‑1987, the same representative stated before the Court that the Government had been moved for the payment of respondent No.l's amount and as soon as the amount was received the same would be paid to the respondent No.l. He also referred to section 39 of the Arbitration Act, according to which only those orders which are covered by clauses (1) to (6) of subsection (1) will be appealable but as no objections were filed by the appellants, therefore, the appeal was not competent and additionally the same was hopelessly barred by time, as such when the appeal is not competent the revision may not be entertained. We have given due consideration to the arguments of the learned counsel but as we have come to the conclusion that the arbitrator as per his own statement made the award without issuing any notice to the parties and making an inquiry, therefore, it would be in the substantial interest of justice to convert the appeal into revision and if we refuse to do so it would amount to miscarriage of justice. It is the cardinal principle of jurisprudence that a party must have ample opportunity to contest a case before an arbitrator like a Court of law. The functions of an arbitrator are primarily judicial functions and the arbitrator is duty bound to perform such functions in accordance with the accepted norms of procedure.

14. Under section 115, C.P.C. Court has inherent power to invoke its jurisdiction if any Court subordinate to it has exercised its jurisdiction illegally or with material irregularity. The foundation of the trial Court's jurisdiction in the present case rests upon award of the arbitrator and if the award is nullity in the eye of law then any order passed by a subordinate Court confirming award would amount to exercising its jurisdiction illegally and with material irregularity, Section 115 applies in cases where the jurisdiction has been irregularly exercised or the subordinate Court illegally assumed such jurisdiction. A revision would lie when the order is unwarranted in law. The High Court would interfere if such a course is necessary in the interest of justice and no other remedy is open. The power under section 115 is to exercise jurisdiction with a view to promote the cause of justice and not to defeat the ends of justice. The High Court can legitimately interfere if the order passed by a subordinate Court comes to its notice in any proceedings and that order is illegal and such an action is necessary in the interest of justice, then a revision is competent; where the award was made without any notice to a party; or where the award is impugned on the ground that the arbitrator held the inquiry in the absence of a party and the trial Court has not considered such inherent defects then even though no party had pointed out such defects to the Court, the High Court will exercise its powers under section 115, C.P.C. Such errors committed by the lower Court or the Arbitrator amount to errors of law which result in miscarriage of justice and it amounts to material irregularity. There is nothing in section 39 or section 41 of the Arbitration Act to deprive the High Court of its power of revision conferred on it by section 115. Reference may be made to L. Charan Das v. L. Gur Saran Das Kapur A I R 1945 All. 146 and Sm. Balika Devi and another v. Kedar Nath Puri A I R 1956 All. 377. There is nothing in the Arbitration Act to exclude the power o the Court to set aside an award except on the application of the parties. The Court has suo motu power to set aside the award for proper reasons and this' can only be done if the High Court exercises its powers under section 115, C . P. C . It has been held in Hakim Muhammad Buta and another v. Habib Ahmad and others P L D 1985 SC 153 that the High Court will not be deprived of its power under section 115 to suo motu go into the question if the material already on record was sufficient to establish that the suit was beyond time. Similarly in Muhammad Swaleh and another v. Messrs United Grain and Fodder Agencies P L D 1964 SC 97 it was observed that there is no bar of suo motu revision by the High Court.

15. As regards the objection of limitation we may point out that no period of limitation is prescribed for presentation of revision and additionally limitation is not applicable where order is nullity in law as held in Mst. Rehmat Bibi and others v. Punnu Khan and others 1986 S C M R 962. We, therefore, convert this appeal into revision as we have found that the award of the Arbitrator is not sustainable in law and for the reasons which we are discussing hereinbelow:‑--

16. The arbitrator in his statement has admitted that he did not summon the parties. He had given the Arbitration Award on the basis of record. After he made award, he had not given any notice to the parties as required under section 14(1) of the Arbitration Act. He has not recorded any evidence and thus did not give any chance to the appellants to pursue their case. It is the accepted principle of law of Arbitration that the arbitrator before he enters into the arbitration proceedings should give notice of the time and place of the meeting. He should also give reasonable time and opportunity to the parties of proving their case. If no notice was given then it means that no proper inquiry was conducted and the award was invalid. Such view was taken in Paratapsingh v. Kisandprasad & Co. Ltd. A I R 1932 Bom.

68. In the University of Dacca through its Vice‑Chancellor and another v. Zakir Ahmad PLD 1965 SC 90 it was held that if all the proceedings by whomsoever held whether judicial or administrative, principles of natural justice have to be observed if the proceedings might result in consequences affecting the person or property or other right of the parties concerned. This rule applies even though there may be no positive words in the statute or legal document whereby the power is vested to take such proceedings, for, in such cases this requirement is to be implied into it as the minimum requirement of fairness.

17. Apart from the fact that no notice of the proceedings was given by the Arbitrator, the record was examined in the absence of the parties. It was observed in Province of Punjab through Collector, Bahawalpur v. Sufi Habib Ullah 1982 S C M R 243 that the decision must be based upon the evidence produced before the Arbitrator and if the Arbitrator has not done so the award is certainly liable to be set aside. An adjudication behind the back of a party is no adjudication at all in the eye of law as observed in Messrs Nadeem Bhai & Co. v. Messrs Pak Jute Balers Ltd. P L D 1965 Dacca 258. No proceedings can be taken behind the back of a party and if no evidence is recorded the award is vitiated as held in the Punjab Province v. Dr. Lakhmi Dass and others A I R 1944 Lah.

149. In R. Palavesam Chettiar v. Narayana Aiyar A I R 1925 Mad. 1086 it was held that taking of evidence in absence of party is illegal. In Payyavula Vengamma v. Payyavula Kesanna and others A I R 1953 SC 21 'the arbitrator examined the defendant in the absence of the plaintiff and also perused the will without giving an opportunity to the plaintiff,) the course of proceedings adopted by the arbitrator was obviously contrary to the principles of natural justice. The arbitrator was guilty of legal misconduct. Similar view was taken in Mohammad Afzal v Abdul Hameed A I R 1925 Lah. 570 and Abdul Hameed v. Muhammad Afzal A I R 1927 Lah. 425. It was incumbent upon an arbitrator as required under section 13 of the Arbitration Act that he shall administer oath to the parties and witnesses appearing before him. This can only be done if a notice is given to the parties by the arbitrator before he starts the arbitration proceedings. Then a notice is also required under section 14(1) of the Arbitration Act and the object of such notice is only to inform the parties that the award has been made so that they may file an application for filing of award and similar object of notice is to enable a party to file an application for setting aside of the award.

18. The learned counsel for the respondent No.l submitted that the Court had issued the notice to the appellants after an application was moved by respondent No.l for making the award rule of Court, therefore, that was sufficient compliance of principles of natural justice and as the appellants had not filed any objections rather they were willing to make the payment as determined in the award, therefore, this objection is not valid. The learned counsel has referred to Sind Employees' Social Security Institution and another v. Dawood Cotton Mills Ltd. P L 1) 1977 SC 177; Ansar Ahmad v. Karachi Development Authority through its Director‑General, Karachi P L D 1973 Kar. 302; Government of Pakistan v. Messrs Indo‑Pakistan Corporation Ltd. etc. P L D 1979 SC 723 and Syed Muhammad Ali Shah Bokhari v. Chief Administrator of Auqaf Punjab, Lahore and 3 others P L D 1972 Lah . 416. None of the authorities is applicable to the facts of the present case. In P L D 1977 SC 177 it was observed 'we have not been shown any statutory provision in the Ordinance, or the rules and regulations framed thereunder, requiring a mandatory notice of hearing before the creation of demand for social contribution'. The authority is inapt as under the Arbitration Act there is a statutory provision of notice. In P L D 1973 Kar. 3U2 it has been held 'there Must be some right of which a person is sought to be deprived, before he could claim benefit of show‑cause'. In P L D 1979 SC 723 it was stated that 'the impugned Notification though passed without hearing yet company was entitled to challenge the same under para. 6 of Martial Law Regulation and company having exercised such right alleged illegality was cured'. In P L D 1972 Lah. 416 it has been observed that 'two factors which may exclude by implication, the application of the rule of audi alteram partem are: (i) where legislation expressly requires notice and hearing for certain purposes but imposes no procedural requirement for other purposes. (ii) where appropriate substitutes for prior notice and opportunity to be heard are available. Even though discretion of any official may be abused, yet it is not a requirement of due process that there be judicial inquiry before discretion can be exercised. It is sufficient where only property rights are concerned, that there is at some stage an opportunity for a hearing and a judicial determination'. These authorities are not applicable to the facts of the present case and, therefore, no help can be sought by the respondent No.l from these precedents.

19. The subordinate Court did not care to obtain original or certified copy of the arbitration award. Only photostat copy has been filed by the respondent No.l, which was made the rule of Court. The arbitrator in his deposition in this Court has stated that he had submitted the award to the Chief Engineer Mr. Abdul Saleem Durrani and .record to Mr. Rashid Executive Engineer. The Chief Engineer was not a party to the proceedings before the trial Court as the Province of Baluchistan through Secretary C&W and Muhammad Azam Pathan the arbitrator were respondents. Unless the primary evidence is not available the secondary evidence cannot be accepted. No effort was made to bring before the Court the original arbitration award and it has not been ,shown as to how the photostat copy was admitted in evidence. It must be shown in evidence that the photograph of a document is a copy of original document. Unless that is proved such. document cannot be admitted in evidence. The provision of secondary evidence is incorporated in section 63 of the Evidence Act‑and section 74 of the Qanun‑e‑Shahadat. As the award or its certified copy was not filed, therefore, the petitioners even if they were served cannot be penalised as the application for setting aside the award on the grounds stated in section 30 of the Arbitration Act cannot be made unless it is filed under section 14(2) and the Court shall thereupon give notice to the parties of the filing of award. It was held in Firm Shriram Haracharandas Khamgaon v. The President, the Cotton Seed Forward Delivery Managing Association Ltd., Khamgaon and others A I R 1954 Nag. 236 that if an award or its copy is in fact filed in Court by party, it is not a valid filing under section 14(2) unless the party has the authority of the arbitrators or umpire. Therefore, to our mind the award was not validly filed in Court as required under law and the proceedings could not be conducted by the subordinate Court as has been done by it in the present case, because the period of limitation runs from the date of service of notice of filing of the award. In the absence of any award the proceedings under the Arbitration Act could not be done and as such the illegality committed by the trial Court is apparent on record which can be interfered with under section 115, C.P.C.

20. It is now to be seen whether the action of the arbitrator in not summoning the parties is condonable or it amounts to misconduct. Misconduct has not been defined in Arbitration Act. It has been defined in Halsbury's Laws of England, Vol. 2, 3rd Ed., as follows.

"It is difficult to give any exhaustive definition of what amount to misconduct on the part of the arbitrator or umpire. The expression is of wide import, including on the one hand bribery and corruption and on the other a mere mistake as to the scope of the authority conferred by the agreement of reference or a mere error of law appearing on‑the face of the award."

21. There are two kinds of misconduct; one is moral and the other is legal. Moral misconduct may be committed where the arbitrator has accepted some bribe or some other favour from a party in whose favour the award has been given. Legal misconduct' would be where, the arbitrator had honestly to the best of his ability performed the arbitration proceedings and gave the award, but no notice was given to the parties and the evidence was recorded behind the back of a party. In such cases there may not be a stigma on moral conduct but even then the award would be set aside on legal misconduct. In Messrs Afiluddin Brothers Ltd. v. Messrs Pak. Jute Balers, Narayanganj 1970 S C M R 1 it has been held that 'Legal misconduct means misconduct in the judicial sense arising from some honest, though erroneous, breach and neglect of duty on the part of the arbitrators causing miscarriage of justice'. In A I R 1953 SC 21 referred to above, it was held if the arbitrator adopted the course of proceedings contrary to the principles of natural justice he was guilty of legal misconduct. Similar view was taken in A I R 1925 Lah. 570 and A I R 1927 Lah. 425 already referred to above. The legal misconduct of the arbitrator is a patent error of law which, vitiates the award and this error of law is apparent on the face of record. Even if no objection was filed against the award, it was the duty of subordinate Court under section 16 of the Arbitration Act to, see if the award suffers from anything.

21. The Court has not applied its mind to the facts of the case and mechanically passed the impugned order. It has been held in Yousuf Ali v. Muhammad Aslam Zia and 2 others P L D 1958 SC 104 that where the Legislature clothes an order with finality, it always assumes that the order which it declares to be final is within the powers of the authority making it, and no party can plead as final an order made in excess of the powers of the authority making it, in the eye of the law such order being void and non‑existent. And if on the basis of a void order subsequent orders have been passed either by the same authority or by other authorities, the whole series of such orders, together with the superstructure of rights and obligations built upon them, must, unless some statute or principle of law recognizing as legal the changed position of the parties is in operation, fall to the ground because such orders have as little legal foundation as the void order on which they are founded. In Khuda Bakhsh v. Khushi Muhammad and 3 others P L D 1976 SC 208 it was observed that the order was void ab initio on account of want of jurisdiction. It was nullity and could be ignored.

22. The learned counsel for the respondent No.l has referred to the following observations of the arbitrator:

"Subsequently this case was taken up and tried by the Summary Military Court No.3 Quetta under M.L.O. 17 and after a thorough hearing and investigation, all the accused were acquitted by the Court honourably, simultaneously directing the department to clear the payment and security of the contractor (Annexure 'F') .

Having been acquitted by the Summary Military Court, the contractor approached the department for release of his balance payment worth Rs.10,57,000.

There is a lot of correspondence between the contractor and the department, so also, between various offices of the department regarding release of the payment of contractor Haji Mohammad Hassan. It was somewhere in June 1981 that on the demand of the B&R Department (Annexures 'G', 'H', 'I' and 'J') funds to the tune of Rs.10,57,000 were released by the Finance Department and placed at the disposal of Superintending Engineer, Provincial B&R Circle, Quetta, under Chief Engineer, Communications and Works Department, Quetta's No. 41‑B/ 80‑81/2388, dated 10‑5‑1981 under the Head of Account 'A‑I Roads'. It was then opined by the Superintending Engineer, Provincial B&R Circle, Quetta, vide his No.34‑79/330‑32/G, dated 13‑5‑1981 (Annexure 'K') that payment of dues under A‑I Roads was not in order because the road in question was federalised. On this the Secretary, Communications and Works Department Quetta, conveyed the decision of Finance Department vide his No. 40‑B/80‑81/579‑80/B, dated 22‑6‑1980 (Annexure 'L') to the effect that since the claim pertained to the period when road was not a federal subject as such the liability is to be cleared out of A‑I road grant. In spite of this clarification, payment was not made to the contractor on the pretext of detailed verification of the claim at site. Resultantly at the close of the financial year the funds were surrendered/ redistributed."

23. No opportunity was afforded to the appellants to rebut the above observations as they are not admitted by them. We may also refer to the application submitted in the Court of Civil Judge under sections 14 and 17 of the Arbitration Act, it was stated by the respondent No.l that Rs.10,57,000 were payable to the applicant. Now if this amount was already settled as stated by respondent No. 1, there was no question of reference to the arbitration and the respondent No.l should have sought his remedy for the recovery of the amount by way of civil suit. But really if there was some dispute as the appellants have also claimed that Rs.3,63,007 were due against the respondent No.l and such dispute was referred to the arbitrator then it was the bounden duty of the arbitrator to have decided the dispute after giving full opportunity to the parties; and as this has not been done, therefore, the award cannot be made rule of Court. We, therefore, accept this appeal ‑‑ set aside the order of Additional District Judge making the award rule of Court. The next question arises whether we should remit the award to the arbitrator for fresh decision but as allegations have been alleged by the appellants against the arbitrator, therefore, we are not inclined to refer the same to the arbitrator. However, any party may invoke the arbitration clause and get any arbitrator appointed in accordance with the terms of agreement or they may seek their remedy in accordance with law. The court‑fee paid by the appellants be returned to them. There would be‑no order as to costs.

M. B. A. /304/B Order accordingly