KUTTAN Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Pettah, the petitioner in C.R.P. No. 534 of 1975, claims to be the legally wedded second wife of the petitioner in C. R. P. No. 305 of 1975. The latter filed a return for a family consisting of himself and his wife Meenakshy. Both the ladies have no property. At the same time an area of 3.47 acres in extent belonging to him was held to be an excess over the ceiling area allowable to the family for which he filed a return. This was opposed by the petitioners in both the revisions Incidentally the status of Pettah as assessee's second wife was also in dispute. The Taluk Land Board found against the alleged status and on that alone held that the petitioner in C.R.P. No. 305 of 1975 should surrender 3.47 acres as excess land. This has occasioned these revision petitions.

(2.) In the nature of the facts set out above it is unnecessary to go into the status of Pettah for, even assuming she is a legally wedded wife, she being a separate family for purposes of the ceiling provisions (see Explanation I to S.82) cannot claim her husband to be a member of her separate family or reckon the properties held by him in excess of the ceiling area of the family for which he filed a return as the properties of her family. Only properties of the members of her statutory family can be taken to be properties of the family for purposes of the ceiling provisions (see S.82(2) of the Act). In that view the petitioner in CRP. No. 305 of 1975 has excess land and the order of the Taluk Land Board is right. Ceiling provisions of the Act have ignored many of the known concepts of an ordinary family. A person cannot claim to hold more property to support an adult unmarried son or an unmarried adult daughter even if they are indigent. They should look after themselves. If he has more than one wife be cannot claim to hold property for supporting more than one. Polygamy is not recognised. In former days when investments in banks and companies were not very common, investment in property was alone taken as safe and many invested their hard earned savings in land for future use like education of sons, marriage of daughters and one's own maintenance in old age. They all have miscalculated the future set up of society and the law. The provisions of the Kerala Land Reforms Act proceed entirely on a different economic principle. Too much investment in land is taken as an exploitation of the landless and a redistribution of land with little regard to an economic ceiling area but with more emphasis on the limit of the area of the holding is aimed at by the Act, and though it is revolutionary is the law of the land. Hence the argument of the revision petitioner's counsel that the petitioner in CRP. No. 534 of 1975 goes without anything has no relevancy. In this view while setting aside the finding of the Taluk Land Board on the status of the petitioner in CRP. No.534 of 1975 as unnecessary, the order of the Taluk Land Board is sustained for the reasons stated above. The revision petitions are disposed of as above. No costs.