KURIAN Vs. CHACKO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The court below was, in my view, right in declining a stay of the suit. For S.32 of Act I of 1964 to apply so as to bar a suit there must first be a holding, and, in the absence of any provision of law excluding its jurisdiction, the question whether the property in suit constitutes a holding so as to attract the bar is primarily a question for the court in which the suit is brought to decide. I see nothing in S.32 which vests exclusive jurisdiction in the matter in the Land Tribunal or which otherwise bars the jurisdiction of the civil court either expressly or impliedly. It is said that the word holding in the section must be read as alleged holding so that the moment a person, even a rank trespasser, claims to be a tenant and makes an application to a Land Tribunal for determining the fair rent of his alleged holding, a suit for his eviction would be barred. I see no warrant for so altering the section and if that is what the legislature meant nothing would have been simpler for it than to say land instead of holding. It is also said that unless the section is read as barring the jurisdiction of the civil court to decide the question whether the land constitutes a holding or not, the section would serve little purpose. I do not know whether that is so, but even if it were, that, by itself would be insufficient to imply an ouster of the jurisdiction of the civil court. Lastly, it is said that the court below has failed to decide whether the land in suit is a holding within the meaning of Act I of 1964 and has merely depended on the decision of this court in C. R. P. 688 of 1961 that it is not a holding under Act 4 of 1961. But it is not shown how, according to the definitions in the two Acts, the suit property can be a holding under Act I of 1964 if it is not a holding under Act 4 of 1961.