NARASIMHAM, C. J.

( 1 ) THIS is an application under Article 226 of the Constitution by the owner of wet lands in village Raghunathpur, in Chatrapur Taluk of Ganjam-district, challenging the validity of the Orissa. Tenants Relief Act 1955 (Orissa Act V of 1955) (hereinafter referred to as the Act ).

( 2 ) IN 1948 the Orissa Legislature passed an Act known as the Orissa Tenants protection Act for the purpose of granting temporary protection from eviction to the tiller of the soil (usually known as Bhagchassis) and also for reducing the produce rent payable by a tenant to his landlord. After the coming into force of the constitution the validity of this Act was unsuccessfully challenged before a Division bench of this Court in the case reported in Sashi Bushan v. Mangal, ILR (1953)Cut 45: (AIR 1953 Orissa 171) (A ). In that decision the full history of the circumstances leading to the passing of the orissa Tenants Protection Act was given and it is unnecessary to repeat the same here. It is sufficient to say that the Legislature thought that the insecurity of tenure of the actual cultivator was mainly responsible for the deficiency in agricultural production and that the incidence