CHADAMI LAL Vs. GENERAL MANAGER WESTERN RAILWAY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a defendant's appeal that arises out of a suit for an injunction and recovery of damages. The respondent viz. the Union of India was the plaintiff. aS owner of the erst-while East Indian Railway, it claimed to be the owner of the Harangau Railway Station with all the lands adjacent to it and bounded and demarcated by the railway boundary posts and fencing. On the north of the railway land just adjacent to it there is a glass factory of the appellant known as the Jain Glass Works. The plaintiff took exception to the defendant's construction of a pucca drain for the discharge of the foul refuse water from his ractory on the railway land. In the sketch plan filed along with the plaint which was subsequently made a part of the decree of the trial court, the drain was shown by letters AB. The further grievance of the plaintiff was that the foul refuse water of the defendant's factory after coming out of the drain was being allowed to stagnate on the plaintiff's land and was causing damage. The plaintiff contended that the defendant had no right to discharge the water in the manner he was doing and it was therefore prayed( a) That the defendant be ordered to stop discharging or stagnating refuse foul water through the drain into, on, or upon the plaintiffs aforesaid land, as shown in the annexed plan. (b) That the defendant be restrained by a perpetual injunction from discharging or flowing or stagnating any water into, on or upon the plaintiff's land. (c) That a decree for Rs. 50/- on account of damages caused to the plaintiff's land be awarded to the plaintiff as against the defendant. (d) Costs of the suit be awarded to the plaintiff against the defendant.

(2.) The suit was contested by the defendant, who pleaded that his glass factory had been constructed in the year 1928 but for more than 60 years the water of all the plots over which the factory had been built and that of all adjoining plots used to accumulate in plot No. 380 which was Pokhar and the water from this Pokhar used to flow towards the railway boundary and then used to pass into a Nala situated in village Ulao near the factory. He further pleaded that the slope of the flow of water had always been towards the south of the factory to the Jharna through the Pokhar, and when the defendant's factory was built the flow continued to be on the same side. He said that there was no other outlet for water on any side. He denied that any damage had been caused to the plaintiff on account of the flow of water and pleaded that the plaintiffs rights had not been interfered with at all. He also claimed to have acquired a prescriptive right of easement regarding How of the water of his factory on the Plaintiff's land, and said that the plaintiff had no right in law to complain about the same. The Court's jurisdiction was challenged and limitation, insufficiency of court-fee and undervaluation were pleaded.

(3.) The learned Munsif rejected the pleas of undervaluation, insufficiency of court-tee and want of jurisdiction. It found that the land claimed by the plaintiff had been acquired under the Land Acquisition Act in 1933-34 and under Section 16 of the Act. All easementary rights if any which the defendant or his predecessors might have acquired earlier had been extinguished. He was also of opinion that as 60 years had not elapsed after the acquisition of the land the defendant could not claim to have acquired any right of easement for flow of water. He did not accept the plaintiffs' plea that any damage had actually been caused to its land. aS a result of these findings he decreed the plaintiff's claim for a permanent injunction but dismissed it for damages. He left the parties to bear their own costs.