Venkatarama Ayyar, J.-

This is a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution for issuing a writ of certiorari or other appropriate writ to quash an order of the State of Madras, dated 13th March, 1951. The second respondent is the Rajah of Ramanathapuram, whose zamindari was one of the estates permanently settled under Regulation XXV of 1802. On 1st July, 1946, he granted a lease to the petitioners of the right to fish chanks in the Gulf of Mannar and Palk Bay opposite the coast of the zamindari for a period of ten years on an annual rent of Rs.14,000. The Legislature of the Province of Madras passed the Madras Estates (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act (XXVI of 1948), hereinafter referred to as the Act, abolishing the estates within the State of Madras and the Ramanathapuram zamindari was notified in accordance with the provisions of that Act, on 7th September, 1949, and the result of that Notification was that under section 3 of the Act the entire zamindari vested in the State of Madras. Acting under section 20 of the said Act, the State of Madras terminated by its proceedings dated 3rd March, 1951, the lease in favour of the petitioners dated 1st July, 1946, and sent the following communication dated 13th March, 1951, to them:

“The lease of chank fisheries off the oast of Ramanathapuram granted by the Rajah of Ramanathapuram to Messrs. A.M.S.S.V.M. and Co., Kilakkarai, is cancelled under second proviso to section 20 of the Estates Abolition Act. The Estate Manager, Ramanathapuram, is requested to hand over the chank fisheries to the Government Fisheries Department.”

The present application has been taken out by the lessees for quashing this order as unconstitutional and illegal. The State of Madras who is the first respondent contests the application, while the Rajah of Ramanathapuram, the second respondent, supports it. On behalf of the petitioners, Mr.M.RM. Abdul Kareem urged the following contentions:

“1. The Act in so far as it relates to fisheries in the seas is beyond the competence of the Madras Legislature, as the seas are outside the territory of the State.

2. The Act is also incompetent as being legislation on Inter-State trade and commerce which is exclusively within the competence of the Union under Entry 4a of the Union List in Schedule 7 to the Constitution.

3. Even if the Act is a valid piece of legislation, the termination of the lease on 13th March, 1951, is bad because three months’ notice was not given as required by section 20 of the Act.”

It is necessary for a correct appreciation of the true legal position to relate the history and nature of the chank fisheries off the coast of Ramanathapuram which form the subject-matter of this application. Between the main land of India forming the southernmost portion of it and the island of Ceylon which lies to the east and south of it, there lies a large expanse of sea-water, the northern sector of which is termed the Palk Bay and the southern, the Gulf of Mannar. They are divided by the island of Rameswaram and a continuous line of coral-reefs running east to west on which runs the causeway known as the Ramasethu or Adams Bridge, leading to the main land of Ceylon. The island of Rameswaram is separated from the main land of India by a narrow Strait known as the Straits of Pamban, 1350 yards broad. The Palk Bay is roughly 70 miles long and 50 or 60 miles broad and is bounded on the north and west by the Districts of Tanjore and Ramanathapuram which form part of the State of Madras, on the south by the Pamban Straits, island of Rameswaram, which belongs to India and the Ramasethu and on the east by the island of Ceylon. On the north-east it opens into the Bay of Bengal, the passage at that point not being more than 1/9th of the circumference of the Bay. Navigation in this Gulf is difficult by reason of rocks, reefs and shoals of which it is full. The southern sector called the Gulf of Mannar runs southward from the Rameswaram-Ramasethu line and is bounded on

Click Here to Read the rest of this document