DAULATRAO MALOJIRAO Vs. GOVERNMENT OF BOMBAY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal and cross-appeal from the judgment dated July 31, 1940, of the First Class Subordinate Judge of Dharwar.

(2.) THE plaintiff, who is the appellant in this Court, claims to be the saranjamdar of an estate of which his ancestors had been tenants-for-life for a great many years. THE estate was formerly part of a larger saranjam estate known as the Gajendragad estate registered in the books of Government in the name of an elder branch of the appellant's family. In or about the year 1842 one of the saranjamdars of this elder branch appointed as manager of a part of the Gajendragad estate a certain kulkarni, who was the ancestor of respondent No. 2. Whether this appointment was made orally or in writing does not appear, and no documentary confirmation of it is forthcoming. However, there is no dispute between the parties that some arrangement was in fact made, nor is it disputed that in consideration of hereditary services to be rendered by the kulkarni and his descendants in managing part of the estate and collecting the rents and profits thereof the kulkarni and his descendants were to retain for their own use the rents and profits of a certain portion thereof being some sixty acres of land formerly part of Survey No. 83, but now known by Survey Nos. 121-122-123-124.

(3.) IN the year 1882 the case of Ramchandra v. Venkatrao (1882) I. L. R. 6 Bom. 568 came before this High Court, and it was held that it was for Government to determine how saranjam grant were to be held and inherited, and that the Courts are bound to determine claims relating to the saranjam estates in accordance with rules laid down by the British Government. That case was between private persons : as also was the case of Shekh Sultan Sani v. Shekh Ajmodin (1892) I. L. R. 17 Bom. 431 P. C. , which went to the Privy Council in 1892. Their Lordships had occasion to consider the nature of a saranjam estate, and in the judgment of the Board delivered by Lord Hannen there appears at p. 447 the following passage: With regard to the expression contained in some of the sanads previously cited of the grant being to the person named, 'his son, grandson, &c. , from generation to generation,' it has been observed by many writers of authority on this subject that they do not, as might be supposed, impart a fixed hereditary tenure. Colonel Etheridge, in his preface to the narrative of the Bombay INam Commission, quotes the language of Sir Thomas Munro in a minute of the 15th March 1822, in which he states that the ' terms in such documents (sanads) ' for ever', 'from generation to generation' or in Hindu grants,' while the sun and the moon endure', are mere forms of expression, and were never supposed either by the donor or receiver to convey the 'durability which they imply, or any beyond the will of the sovereign'; and in a subsequent minute of 16th January 1823, Sir Thomas Munro shows that while the seizure of private property by the native princes would have been considered unjust by the country, jaghir grants were not regarded by the people in the light of private property (Etheridge, p. 14). Their Lordships entertain no doubt that the engagements entered into by the English Government with the Raja of Satara and with the several jaghirdars, did not impart any greater fixity of tenure than had been previously enjoyed by those jaghirdars under the native rulers, and that their jaghirs were liable to resumption at the will of the Government, although from reasons of political expediency the English authorities would not be disposed to add to the disturbance and confusion attending a conquest, by dispossessing the holders of property to any greater extent than was necessary for safety. Then at p. 456 his Lordship observes: Their Lordships are of opinion that the question to whom a saranjam or jahagir shall be granted upon the death of its holder, is one which belongs exclusively to the Government, to be determined upon political considerations, and that it is not within the competency of any legal tribunal to review the decision which the Government may pronounce. This principle is clearly expressed, not for the first time, in Bombay Act VII of 1863, Section 2, Clause 3, and is recognised in cases where the question has been raised IN 1898 Government made rules for the better regulation of saranjam estates. Rule 1 is as follows: Saranjam shall be ordinarily continued in accordance with the decision already passed or which may hereafter be passed by Government in each case.