Hui Yee Lai v. Chan Kam Ling
Read the full judgment text of CACV 36/1973 on BabelCite. This Court of Appeal judgment.
1. The present case comes before this court on appeal against a decision of the District Judge on a preliminary point. The Respondent sued for possession of premises which were let by him to the Appellant in 1968. The case turns upon the construction of a tenancy Agreement. That document is in Chinese. The parties agreed to come before the District Court for the construction of the document, for upon that document turned the question whether the Appellant was entitled to be in possession as a te
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CACV000036/1973 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG (APPELLATE JURISDICTION) CIVIL APPEAL NO. 36 OF 1973 (On appeal from K.C.J. 485/73) -----------------
----------------- Coram: Huggins, McMullin & Leonard, JJ. Date of Judgment: 13th November 1973. ----------------- JUDGMENT ----------------- Huggins, J.: 1. The present case comes before this court on appeal against a decision of the District Judge on a preliminary point. The Respondent sued for possession of premises which were let by him to the Appellant in 1968. The case turns upon the construction of a tenancy Agreement. That document is in Chinese. The parties agreed to come before the District Court for the construction of the document, for upon that document turned the question whether the Appellant was entitled to be in possession as a tenant. In the course of the proceedings before the learned District Judge the Respondent put in a certified translation of the Chinese Agreement. Thereupon counsel on the other side sought to put in a different translation certified by a different Court Translator. Unfortunately the learned District Judge was content to leave matters like that and to decide the case on the bases of both translations. The difficulty in this case is that on the basis of the second translation he came to his decision "not without difficulty" - and it is probably as to that particular part of the case that the case will be argued in this court. 2. While we appreciate that the learned judge hoped thereby to shorten the proceedings in our view it was not a correct procedure thus to leave the facts of the case in the air. Where a document in Chinese is produced in court the judge must initially decide what is the correct rendering into English and we think we have no alternative but to send the case back forthwith to the District Judge to hear evidence and to decide what is the correct translation in English, the parties not being ready to adduce evidence before us. 3. We would add one further comment. The translations which are now before this court are about one foolscap page in length. I have not counted the number of alterations in ink which have been made on one of them but there must be twenty, if not more. In the view of this court it is wrong that translations should be put in in this form and where any alterations are necessary to a translation a fair copy of the translation ought in all cases to be made before it is presented. This is of particular importance in criminal cases, where a jury might be affected by the previous translation, which is commonly not obliterated. 4. The order of the court, then, will be that this case be remitted to the District Court for the determination of the one issue, What is the correct English translation of the Chinese tenancy Agreement? Should the learned judge come to the conclusion that neither of the existing translations is entirely correct he will have to review his judgment: otherwise the relevant part of his judgment will stand. It may or may not be desired to pursue this appeal, but we give liberty to restore. 13th November 1973. Representation: |