RANI RATNESH KUMARI Vs. STATE OF UTTAR PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal by certificate is directed against the judgment of the Allahabad High Court dated May 6, 1966, by which the special appeal filed by the present respondents was allowed and the judgment of a learned single Judge of that Court dated January 2, 1964, allowing the writ petition of the present appellant Rani Ratnesh Kumari was set aside.

(2.) It is not in controversy that Manchhanna taluqua, or Mainpuri Raj, was a part of the Mainpuri district in Uttar Pradesh. The district originally belonged to the Nawab Wazir of Oudh, who ceded it to the East India Company in 1801. Raja Dalal Singh was then the owner of the Manchhanna taluqa. A part of his estate was taken over by the British Government. Raja Dalal Singh died in 1829, and was succeeded by Raja Ganga Singh. Settlement operations of the taluqa lands were carried out from time to time. It came to notice during the settlement operations of 1848 that there were under-proprietors or "biswadars" in 133 villages of the taluqa. It was decided by the Government that while the 133 biswadari villages would be settled with biswadars, the other villages would remain under the direct engagement of the Raja and he would receive an allowance or "malikana" for the 133 villages at 18 per cent of the assets leaving 60 per cent of the realisation with the Government as land revenue and 32 per cent with the biswadars as their share. The settlement was revised thereafter and the assets of the biswadars were redistributed so as to give 55 per cent of the realization to the Government as revenue, 20 1/4 to the Raja as "malikana" and 24 3/4 to the biswadars as their share. Then came the settlement of 1872 when Raja Ram Pratap Singh tried to reopen the question of his direct engagement with the Government even in regard to the biswadari villages. It was ultimately agreed that the Raja would receive, in respect of each village, the same amount as before by way of "malikana" and that the settlement would be made directly with the biswadars who would bear the burden of the arrangement. The "malikana" thus worked out to Rs. 22,502/- per year. It was however stipulated that it would be reduced to 1/11 of the biswadari payment on the death of Raja Ram Pratap Singh. An order was issued in 1873 by which the Raja was held entitled to "malikana" at the rate of 5 per cent of the annual rental. It was reaffirmed during the settlement of 1904-1905 that the estate would get 5 per cent of the assets or 1/10 of the land revenue assessed in the 133 villages. That arrangement continued upto the settlement of 1940. Raja Sheo Mangal Singh, who was the last male descendent of Raja Dalal Singh, thus received an annual payment of Rs. 8,946/9/4 as annual rental of the 133 biswadari villages. He died in 1938 and thereafter the "malikana" was received by his widow Rani Prabhuraj Kumari. She died in 1951, and then the "malikana" was paid to her daughter Rani Ratnesh Kumari, the present appellant, up to March 1953. The payment was stopped thereafter because of the vesting of the estate in the State under the provisions of the U. P. Zamindari Abolition and Land Reforms Act, 1950, hereinafter referred to as the Act. As the efforts of Rani Ratnesh Kumari for its restoration did not bear fruit, she filed a writ petition in the Allahabad High Court on September 16, 1958 for quashing the State Government"s order refusing the payment of the "malikana" and for a direction that it should continue to be paid to her along with the arrears. She based her claim mainly on the ground that the "malikana" was in the nature of a pension or allowance "in lieu of the taking over, forfeiture or acquisition" of the perpetual hereditary rights of the Raja in the 133 villages and was " in no sense of the term rent or revenue derived from land or any benefit arising out of land". She pleaded that the names of the Rajas was never entered in the record of rights of the 133 villages and that she was "neither intermediary with respect to (those) villages nor (those) villages are included in the estate as defined in the Zamindari Abolition Act. So, according to her, the "malikana" being a pension could not have vested in the State on the issue of the notification under S. 4 of the Act and was not determined under S. 6 (b).

(3.) The State traversed the petitioner"s claim on the ground that the "malikana" was paid to the Raja in his capacity as the superior proprietor of the 133 villages in question, and that it was really in the nature of "a share in the profits of a "mahal" allowed to the superior proprietor at the various settlements." It was pleaded that even though the Raja was not responsible or liable for the payment of the land revenue as the settlement was with the inferior proprietors or "biswadars", the "malikana" was directly connected with the land revenue and the assets of the land of the 133 villages of which the Raja was the superior proprietor. It was also pleaded that the "malikana" represented "a share of the profits of each "mahal" allowed to the superior proprietor in accordance with S. 19 (1) of Regulation VII of 1822, S. 56 of the Land Revenue Act XIX of 1873, and Ss. 75 and 77 of the U. P. Land Revenue Act, 1901." It was pointed out in the quadrennial "khewat" for the years immediately preceding the date of vesting of the estate under the Act, the name of Rani Prabhuraj Kumari was recorded as the proprietor of the "mahals" of the 133 villages and the names of the inferior proprietors were recorded in the subsequent columns. Reference was made to similar "khewat" entries of earlier periods and it was pleaded that the 133 villages were an estimate of the petitioner as defined in the Act and she was an "intermediary" in her capacity as the superior proprietor of the "mahals" on the date immediately preceding the date of vesting of the estate under the Act. In other words, the State Government took the plea that the "malikana" allowance represented a share of profits of each "mahal" and that the payment of the "malikana" was stopped when the estate vested in the State under the provisions of the Act. It was contended that the writ petitioner was entitled to compensation under the provisions of the Act but not to the "malikana" allowance which could not be equated with pension.