Sundara Aiyar J.

1. This is a suit by the owner of a house in Bellary for a declaration of his right to a pial and for restraining the Municipal Council of the town from removing it. At the instance of the Municipal Council the Secretary of State for India in Council was made a party to the suit. The plaintiffs case was that the pial belonged to him and that the municipal council had therefore no right to remove it as it threatened to do. The Council denied the plaintiffs right to the site of the pial and the Government set up its ownership to the site. The issues framed in the suit raised the questions, how long the suit pial was in existence, whether the plaintiff acquired a prescriptive; title to the site of the pial if he was not the original owner and whether the Municipality was entitled to demolish it.

2. Both courts have found that the street was dedicated to the public by the Government. The houses were built on sites originally belonging to Government which it gave to the people when they were compelled to remove from houses occupied by them within the fort of Bellary. The lower Courts also found that the land over which the pial stands was not part of the plaintiff