Gujarat High Court Civil Manual (subordinate court practice), 1960
(1) Rule 1 of Order XLVIII provides that processes shall be served at the expense of the party on whose behalf they are issued unless the Court otherwise directs and that the Court-fees chargeable shall be paid within the time fixed by the Court. For the rules as to process fees see Chapter XXII. (2) For the purpose of payment of diet allowance witnesses are divided into the following Classes :— Class I ... Professional men of high position, Members of Parliament and of the State Legislatures, large land owners and owners of big business organisations and upper grade employees in business organisations, corporations and local bodies, and Class I Government officials who are required to attend the Court in their private capacity. Class II ... Members of local bodies, ordinary professional and business men; land owners other than small farmers; junior employees in business organisations, in Corporations and Local bodies in corresponding grades and Class II Government officials who are required to attend the Court in their private capacity. Class III ... Artisans, clerks, small land owners, village officers and officers in lower grades of Corporations, local bodies and business organisations, and Class III Government officials who are required to attend the Court in their private capacity. Class IV ... Labourers, petty shop-keepers, pedlars and persons other than those in the above classes and Class IV Government Servants who are required to attend the Court in their private capacity. (3) The diet money for the various classes should be as follows :— Class I Rs. 5 Class II 3 Class III 2 Class IV 1 (4) In special cases, and in particular where a person is being examined as an expert, the Court may require such sums as appear reasonable to be paid to a witness. The reasons for ordering payment of higher amounts should be recorded by the Court. (5) Diet money shall be given not only for the period of actual attendance but also for any reasonable time spent in the journey to and from the Court, the ordinary mode of conveyance available being taken into consideration. When the journey is made on foot, 15 miles a day shall be reckoned as the day's journey and subsistence allowance should be paid accordingly. (6) Travelling expenses will be granted according to the rates specified below in all cases in which the Court deems such expenses to be reasonable having due regard to the distance to be traversed and the position and circumstances of the witness :— (i) When the journey is by road, the actual expenses incurred, provided the same be reasonable. (ii) When the journey is wholly or partly by rail or steamer— (a) witness of Class I ... First Class Railway fare ; (b) witnesses of Classes II and III. Second Class Railway fare ; and (c) witness of Class IV ... Third Class Railway fare. (7) Peculiar cases not provided for in the above rules are to be dealt with according to their own merits, and at the discretion of the Court from which subsistence money or the travelling allowance is demanded. (8) Witnesses produced under warrants of arrest should receive subsistence money at the rate allowed to judgment-debtors. (9) When Government as a party to a case asks for a summons to one of its servants for appearance in Court as a witness if it is not required to deposit in Court anything on account of diet money and travelling allowance of the witness. In no case should any money deposited by a party for calling a Government servant as a witness accompany the summons.