SANKARAN KRISHNAN Vs. GOPALAN APPUKUTTAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) 4th defendant in O. S. No. 403 of 1963 on the file of the Court of II Additional Munsiff, Neyyattinkara, is the appellant. This Second Appeal came before us on a reference by one of us (Sukumaran, J.) on the question of interpretation of S. 4a (1) (a) of the Kerala Land Reforms Act (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act' for short ).

(2.) THE matter arises out of a final judgment passed by the learned Munsiff in O. S. No. 403 of 1963, which was a partition suit. THE appellant raised a contention that he was entitled to fixity of tenure under S. 4a (1) (a) of the Act. Learned Munsiff negatived this contention and on appeal to the court of District Judge, the finding of the learned Munsiff was confirmed. In this appeal, the counsel for the appellant challenged the finding of the courts below.

(3.) IN Stroud's Judicial Dictionary, the word 'comprise' has been given the meaning 'include'. IN Lexicon Webster Dictionary, the word 'comprise' has been given the meaning, 'to comprehend, to contain, to include, to consist of, be made up of, to form, and to make up'. IN Chambers 20th Century Dictionary, the meaning given for the word 'comprise' is 'to contain, to include, to comprehend, to consist of, and to hold together. On the basis of the meaning given in the above Dictionaries, learned counsel for the appellant argued that the requirement of S. 4a (1) (a) is satisfied if C schedule was included in the mortgage of 1062 and that it is not the requirement of law that the entire lands included in the mortgage of 1062 should come into possession of the 4th defendant to enable him to claim the benefit of S. 4a (1) (a) in regard to C schedule property. There is substance in the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant.