Judgment

( 1 ) HEGDE, J. : The scope of S. 9 of the U. P. Zamindari Abolition and Land Reforms Act, 1950. (U. P. Act 1 of 1951) (to be hereinafter referred to as the Act) comes up for decision in this appeal by certificate.

( 2 ) THE facts relevant for deciding this appeal are no more in dispute. The respondents were ryots under the appellants in village Nagli Abdulla, a hamlet of village Machhra. The site of the building in dispute in this appeal had been taken by the father of the respondents from the appellants ancestors over 6 years ago and thereafter the respondents put up some buildings on that site for their residential purposes. During the communal disturbances in 1947 they left the village temporarily as a measure of safety and took shelter with some of their relations in some other village at a distant place. They came back to their village in the year 1949 when the conditions improved. At that time they found the appellants occupying that site after putting up a cowshed on the site in which their residential buildings stood. Those residential buildings had been demolished and the site in question included as a part of the house of the appellants, As the appellants refused to deliver possession of the suit property, the respondents instituted a suit for possession of the same on 9/01/1951.

( 3 ) ON 26/01/1951, the Act came into force. S. 4 of the Act provided for the vesting of the estates in the State. It prescribed that as soon as may be after the commencement of the Act, the State Government may, by notificcation, declare that, as from a date to be specified, all estates situate in Uttar Pradesh shall vest in the State and as from the beginning of the date so specified, all such estates shall stand transferred to and vest, except otherwise provided in the Act, in the State free from all encumbrances. S. 6 of the Act enumerates the consequences of the vesting of an estate in the State. S. 9 deals with the buildings in the abadi. Reading Sections 4, 6 and 9, together, it follows that all estates notified under S. 4 vest in the State free from all encumbrances. The quondam proprietors or tenure-holders of those estates lose all interests in those estates. As proprietors or tenure-holders they retain no interest in respect of them whatsoever. But in respect of the lands or buildings enumerated in S. 6 and S. 9, the State settled on the persons who held them certain rights. Though in fact the vesting of the estates and the deemed settlement of some rights in respect of certain classes of lands or buildings included in the estate took place simultaneously, in law the two must be treated as different transactions: first there was a vesting of the estates in the State absolutely and free of all encumbrances. Then followed the deemed settlement by the State of some rights with the persons mentioned in Sections 6 and 9. Therefore, in law it would not be correct to say that what vested in the State are only those interests not coming within S. 6 or 9: see Rana Sheo Ambar Singh v. Allahabad Bank Ltd. , Allahabad, (1962) 2 SCR 441 = (AIR 1961 SC 1790 ). In this connection reference may also usefully be made to the decision of this Court in Shivashankar Prasad Shah v. Vaikunth Nath Singh, Civil Appeal No. 368 of 1966, D/- 3-7-1969 (SC), a decision rendered under the Bihar Land Reforms Act, 1959, the relevant provisions of which are similar to the provisions of the Act. In this case notification under S. 4 of the Act was issued on 1/07/1952. Hence, the vesting contemplated under S. 4 took place on that date.

( 4 ) SECTION 9 of the Act, the section with which we are concerned in this case reads thus:"all wells, trees in abadi, and all buildings situated within the limits of an estate, belonging to or held by an intermediary or tenant or other person, whether residing in the village or not, shall continue to belong to or be held by such intermediary or tenant or person, as the case may be, and the site of the wells or the buildings