SHIDVIRAPPA GURUSATAPPA CHINVAR Vs. SHIVALINGAPPA BASALINGAPPA CHINWAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE pltf. filed a suit in the Court of the Second Class Subordirate Judge, Mudhol State, alleging that he was an agriculturist within the meaning of the Mudhol State Agriculturists' Relief Act and contending that a certain transaction he had entered into with the defts. on 12-8-1937, although ostensibly a sale, was in reality a mortgage and asking for accounts of this mortgage transaction. The trial Court held that the pltf. was not an agriculturist and dismissed his suit. In appeal the learned Dist. J. of Mudhol took a contrary view and held that the pltf. was an agriculturist and remanded the suit to the trial Court for disposal. It is from this decision that this appeal is preferred, and as the matter involved consideration of a rather important question of law, the matter has been referred to this Full Bench. 1a. The Mudhol State Agriculturists' Relief Act came into force on 1-11-1940, and the suit was filed on 20-9-1943. The suit is under Section 14 of that Act which enables an agriculturist whose property is mortgaged to sue for an account of the amount of principal and interest remaining unpaid on the mortgage and for a decree declaring that amount. "agriculturist" is defined in Section 2. The definition lays down that he must possess land used for agricultural purposes within the limits of the Mudhol State and cultivate such land personally or he ordinarily engages personally in agricultural labour, and his income from sources other than agriculture and manual labour should not ordinarily exceed 33 per cent. of his total income, Having filed the suit under Section 14, the pltf. wanted the benefit of Section 6 of that Act, A that section provides: "whenever it is alleged at any stage of any suit or proceeding to which an agriculturist is a party that any transaction in issue entered into by each agriculturist or the person, if any, through whom he claims was a transaction of such a nature that the rights and liabilities of the parties thereunder are triable wholly or in part under this chapter, the Court shall, notwithstanding anything contained in Sections 91 and 92, Evidence Act, 1872, or in any other law for the time being in force, have power to inquire into and determine the real nature of such transaction and decide such suit or proceeding in accordance with such determination and shall be at liberty, notwithstanding anything contained in any law as aforesaid, to admit evidence of any oral agreement or statement with a view to such determination and decision. " Therefore, the pltf. 's contention was that the transaction of 12-8 1937, was in reality a mortgage and he wanted liberty to prove the real nature of the transaction notwithstanding the bar contained in the Indian Evidence Act and other provisions of the law. There is a proviso to this section and the proviso is in these terms :

(2.) NOW, the contention of Mr. Madbhavi is that the proviso refers to transactions entered into after the Act came into force. Mr. Madbhavi says that as in this case the transaction was of 1937 before the Act came into force, it is immaterial and irrelevant whether the pltf. was an agriculturist at that date or not. It is only if the transaction was entered into after 1-11-1940, that the proviso would apply and the Court would have to investigate whether the party challenging the transaction was an agriculturist at the date of the transaction. Now, looking to the plain language used by the Legislature, no limitation or qualification is placed upon the expression "at the time of such transaction. " Obviously, if we were to give this expression its natural meaning, it would mean "at the time of such transaction whenever that transaction was entered into. " But Mr. Madbhavi suggests that we must qualify this expression because according to him the canons of construction require that we must not give a retrospective effect to a piece of legislation which affects or interferes with vested rights. Mr. Madbhavi is quite right, and if this particular piece of legislation we are dealing with did affect vested rights, then we must not give retrospective effect to such a piece of legislation unless the Legislature in clear and explicit terms did intend to affect vested rights. Now, what is the right that is being affected by Section 6 All that Section 6 does is to abrogate, as it were, certain provisions of the Evidence Act with regard to the production of evidence. The Evidence Act precludes the leading of oral evidence to contradict the terms of a written document and the more so when that document has taken the solemn form of a registered document. Section 6 permits a particular class of persons defined in the Act to override those provisions of the Evidence Act and lead oral evidence in order to satisfy the Court what the real nature of the transaction was, notwithstanding what form it took in the written document. It should be noted that the transaction itaelf is not being affected. The rights of the parties under the real transaction are in no way being interfered with. Only permission is being given to the agriculturist to satisfy the Court as to what the real transaction was. We could have understood if Section 6 in any way limited or qualified the rights of the mortgagee or vendee which had accrued to him under the transaction. But that is not the purpose of Section 6. Section 6, in our opinion, is purely procedural and it deals with rules of evidence. Can it then be said that in construing the proviso we must look upon it as affecting substantive rights and, therefore, refuge to put upon it a construction which may give it a retrospective effect ? It cannot be said--and Mr. Madbhavi has not urged it--that his client has any vested right in proce-dure. He has no vested right in certain rules of evidence being observed by a Court of law and, to repeat again, all that Section 6 does is to ask the Court to observe certain rules of evidence contrary to the Evidence Act where certain parties are before the Court.

(3.) IT is then argued that if the definition of "agriculturist" was not in force at the date of the transaction, it is difficult to understand how a party could be an agriculturist at the date of the transaction. It is pointed out that the definition only came into force when the Act came into force, viz. , on 1-11-1940. How then it is asked, could the pltf. be an agriculturist on 12-8-1937, when he entered into the transaction in suit? That argument, in our opinion, does not present any difficulty because it is open to the Legislature to lay down a certain definition and to state that parties answering that definition at a particular time will be entitled to certain benefits. What the Legislature in the proviso does is to state that if a particular person answers the qualifications laid down in the Act which it has passed at the time when he entered into the transaction, then he would got the benefit provided in Section 6. There is one other aspect of the matter which also requires consideration. If Mr. Madbhavi was right in his contention, the result would be that all transactions prior to 1-11-1940, would not come within the purview of the Act to the extent that Section 6 may apply to them; in other words, the result would be that an agriculturist would not be able to challenge any transaction and get relief in respect of that transaction prior to 1-11-1940. It is perfectly true that when the language of a section is clear, it is not for the Court to consider what the object or the intention of the Legislature might have been. Bub when there is any doubt or ambiguity, it is perfectly competent to the Court to look at the preamble of the statute and to determine what was the object that the Legislature had in mind when putting the particular legislation on the statute book. Turning to the preamble of this Act, it states that it is expedient to relieve the agricultural classes in the Mudhol State from indebtedness. Therefore it was to indebted agriculturists that relief was sought to be brought by this Act. The object was not to relieve agriculturists who may have become indebted after the Act came into force; the object was to give relief to those who were already indebted; and certainly if an agriculturist was indebted by reason of a transaction which in reality was a mortgage and not a sale and his property had been taken away by the alleged vendee, then it is clear that the object of the Mudhol State Act was to give relief to such an agriculturist. From this point of view also, we feel that a restricted meaning should not be given to the expression "at the time of such transaction" used in the proviso and that the expression used in it means "at the time of the transaction whenever that transaction might have been entered into. "