Modi, J.—This is a civil regular second appeal by the defendants Asala and three others against the judgment and decree of the District Judge, Jhunjhunu, dated the 23rd November, 1957, affirming the judgment and decree of the Civil Judge, Jhunjhunu, dated the 23rd December, 1956, in a suit for declaration relating to certain agricultural land.

2. As the question of jurisdiction raised in this appeal goes to the root of the case, it is necessary to state the facts with particular reference to that question only. The defendants appellants here, claiming to be tenants with respect to the agricultural land in suit, which is situate in village Mohanbadi and which comprises 37 Bighas of agricultural land appurtenant to a well called Purohitanwala had filed an application to the Anti-Ejectment Officer against their dispossession at the hands of defendants Nos. 5 to 19 in this suit and obtained an order for their reinstatement. See Ex. Al dated the 5th October, 1953. This order had the effect of a decree under sub-sec. (4) of sec. 7 of the Rajasthan (Protection of Tenants) Ordinance No. 9 of 1949. There is material on the record to show that as a result of this order, the appellants were put in possession of the land in dispute on the 7th October, 1953 vide Ex. A-2. Thereupon the plaintiffs Narain and three others who are obviously relations of some of the (proforma) defendants Nos. 5 to 19 here brought the present suit, out of which this appeal arises, for a declaration that the order or decree which had been obtained by the defendants appellants against defendants respondents No. 5 to 19 was not binding on them, and, therefore, it was void and of no effect so far as they were concerned. They also prayed in the alternative that if the court came to the conclusion that the defendants appellants had obtained what they chose to call symbolic possession of the land in suit, then a decree be passed in their favour restoring them to possession. This suit was brought on the 6th January, 1955, in the court of the Civil Judge, Jhunjhunu.

3. Defendants Nos. 5 to 19 allowed the suit to proceed ex parte against themselves. The appellants contested the suit. One of the questions raised by them was that the civil court had no jurisdiction to take cognizance of the suit as it was exclusively triable by a revenue court.

4. Both courts below repelled this contention and decreed the plaintiffs suit. This is how the defendants appellants have come up in second appeal to this Court.

5. The first and foremost question which thus emerges for determination in this appeal is whether the present suit was exclusively triable by a revenue court in accordance with the provisions of the Rajasthan Tenancy Act, 1955 (Act No. 3 of 1955, hereinafter called the Act of 1955) which had come into force on the 15th October, 1955, when the suit was pending in the court of the Civil Judge, Jhunjhunu. It is contended by learned counsel for the defendants appellants that the courts below had fallen into a grave error of law holding that a suit like the present was properly instituted in the civil court. It is submitted that the courts should have looked to the real substance of the suit and not to its outward form and that so looked at, it was clearly governed by secs. 88, 90 or 91 of the Act of 1955, and fell within item Nos. 5, 7 or8 of the Third Schedule of the Act of 1955 and further that the suit was really based on a cause of action in respect of which relief could be lawfully and properly claimed in a revenue court only, and, therefore, under sec. 207 of the Act, the jurisdiction of the civil courts to take cognizance of such a suit was completely barred. It was equally strenuously contended on the side of the contesting respondents that a suit of this character was not directly governed by any of the items in the Third Schedule of the Act of 1955 or by other provisions contained therein, and, therefore, the civil court was perfectly justified in taking cognizance of the

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