Judgement

Consolidated Appeals from a judgment and three decrees of the High Court (October 9, 1913) affirming decrees of the District Court of Kistna, which set aside decrees of a District Munsif s Court.

The appellants held about two-thirds of the inam village of Korragunta in the Northern Circars. The respondents severally held from them parcels of land therein under leases entered into at recent dates but prior to 1908. Bach lease contained the following or a similar clause "As I have taken the land temporarily for cultivation, and as I have no zeroyati thereto, you shall take possession thereof at the end of the term without need of relinquishment by me." It appeared from the evidence that at, or shortly before, the date of each lease the parcel leased had been vacant.

The appellants brought three suits in the Court of the District Munsif of Masulipatam to eject the respondents, each of whom pleaded that the parcel leased to him constituted an "estate," or part of an "estate," within s. 3, sub-s. 2 (d), of the Madras Estates Land Act, 1908, and that consequently under

s. 189 the Revenue Court alone had jurisdiction. The suits were tried together throughout.

The terms of the inam grant under which the appellants held could not be proved. The earliest history of the village appeared from the back of a dumbala dated 1789. It was there stated to have been granted by a Reddi king in 1373 to Brahmins as a " sarva " agraharam, paying nothing to the circar, and to have been confirmed by succeeding rulers at various dates. Dumbalas dated 1785, 1796, and 1797 allowing the inamdars to remove the crops were produced. The village was entered in inam registers, the earliest being dated 1797, as a sarva agraharam, the original grant being stated to have been as above mentioned. There was no evidence that at the date when the grant was made or confirmed any person other than the inamdars was in occupation of the lands under any claim of permanent right, or at all.

A considerable body of evidence was adduced by the plaintiffs to show that for a period of about twenty years the inamdars had dealt with the land and the tenants upon the basis of being owners of the soil. Some evidence to the contrary was adduced by the defendants, and it was also proved that in 1846 the inamdars, who prior to that date had not resided in the village, came to live there in order to facilitate the collection of the rent.

The District Munsif made decrees for ejectment. He held that there was no presumption that the grantees did not own the kudivaram, and that the respondents, upon whom the onus lay to show that the Court had not jurisdiction, had failed to prove the necessary facts.

The District Judge upon appeal set aside the decrees, holding that the village was an estate within s. 3, sub-s. 2 (d), of the Act. He said that it had been laid down in a series of judgments and in the Fifth Report that the ancient Indian rulers had no ownership in the soil, but only a share in its produce ; it was therefore to be inferred that the grant was only of the royal revenue. That view was supported by the fact that the grant was to Brahmins, and by the evidence that prior to 1846 the inamdars had not resided in the village. He considered that the evidence did not prove that the appellants owned the kudivaram, so as to displace the presumption of law which he held arose. He further held that the exception in s. 8 of the Act applied only when an inamdar, who had not previously the kudivaram, acquired it in the whole of the inam lands.

The decision of the District Judge was affirmed by the High Court; the appeal is reported at I. L. R. 38 M. 608. The learned judges (Sadasiva Aiyar and Spencer JJ.) upon their view of the authorities agreed with the view of the District Judge that there was a presumption of law that the grant had been only of the royal revenue from the land ; they concurred in his finding that that presumption was not displaced by the evidence. They further he