Legal Dictionary of Pakistan

Quick lookup for English, Urdu, and Latin legal terms used in Pakistani jurisprudence.

general issue

1. A plea (often a general denial) by which a party denies the truth of every material allegation in an opposing party's pleading. 2. The issue arising from such a plea. "The general issue is a denial of the legal conclusion sought to be drawn from the declaration. It denies by a general form of expression the defendant's liability, and enables the defendant to contest, without specific averments of the defense to be asserted, most of the allegations which the plaintiff may be required to prove to sustain his action, and in some actions to raise also various affirmative defenses. It fails to perform the functions of pleading, either in giving notice or in reducing the case to specific issues." Benjamin J. Shipman, Handbook of Common-law Pleading § 169, at 304 (Henry Winthrop Ballantine ed., 3d ed. 1923).

general issue.

See ISSUE (1.