THAKUR JAGANNATH BAKSH SINGH Vs. SECRETARY OF STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE appellant, who is the taluqdar of Bhawanshahpur, brought his action in the Court of the Civil Judge, Sultanpur, Oudh, claiming a declaration that the United Provinces Tenancy Act, 1939, is either ultra vires or not intra vires of the Provincial Legislature, either in its entirety or at least as regards the provisions, about 42 in number, scheduled to the complaint. His claim failed before the Judge; he then appealed to the Federal Court of India, which dismissed the appeal but granted leave to appeal to this Board.

(2.) THE appellant is the direct descendant of Babu Sitla Baksh Singh, who was grantee of a sanad from the Governor General after the Indian Mutiny of 1857. By this sanad the Crown granted to the appellant's predecessor-in-title the full proprietary rights, the permanent heritable and transferable rights in the ancestral estate which were confirmed by the Oudh Estates Act (No.1 of 1869 ). That Act contains entries of the name of the appellant's predecessor in lists I and II of the lists prepared under Section 8 of the Act, the numbers of the entries being No.241 and No. 108. List No.1 contains a list of all persons who are to be considered taluqdara within the meaning of the Act. THE position of the taluqdar is defined by Section 3 of the Act to be that he should be deemed to have thereby acquired a permanent heritable and transferable right in the estate specified. THE grant of the estate was under Section 3 to be subject to all the conditions affecting the taluqdar contained in the orders passed by the Governor General of India on October 10 and 19, 1859, and republished in the first schedule annexed to the Act and subject also to all the conditions contained in the sanad under which the estate was held. THEse letters are set out in full in Chhail Bihari Lal's book on the Taluqdari Law of Oudh at p. 387 seq. It is enough here to quote the passage in the letter of October 19, 1859, which is specially relevant to the questions involved in this case. This passage, which is set out in the judgment of Gwyer C. J. , in the present appeal in the Federal Court, runs thus: THE sanads declare that while, on the one hand, the Government has conferred on the taluqdars and on their heirs for ever the full proprietary right in their respective estates, subject only to the payment of the annual revenue that may be imposed from time to time, and to certain conditions of loyalty and good service, on the other hand, all persons holding-an interest in the land under the taluqdars will be secured in the possession of the subordinate rights, which they have heretofore enjoyed. THE meaning of this is that, when a regular settlement of the Province is made, wherever it is found that zamindars or other persons have held an interest in the soil intermediate between the raiyat and the taluqdar, the amount or proportion payable by the intermediate holder to the taluqdar and the net jama finally payable by the taluqdar to the Government, will be fixed and recorded after a careful and detailed survey and inquiry into each case, and will remain unchanged during the currency of the settlement, the taluqdar being, of course, free to improve his income and the value of his property by the reclamation of waste lands (unless in cases where usage has given the liberty of reclamation to the zamindar), and by other measures of which he will receive the full benefit at the end of the settlement. Where leases (pattas), are given to the subordinate zamindars, they will be given by the taluqdar, not by the Government. This being the position in which the taluqdars will be placed, they cannot, with any show of reason, complain if the Government takes effectual steps to re-establish and maintain in subordination to them the former rights, as those existed in 1855, of other persons whose connection with the soil is in many cases more intimate and more ancient than theirs; and it is obvious that the only effectual protection, which the Government can extend to these inferior holders, is to define and record their rights, and to limit the demand of the taluqdar as against such person during the currency of the settlement to the amount fixed by the Government as the basis of its own revenue demand.

(3.) THIS being the general nature of the settlement embodied in the sanads and in the Oudh Estates Act, 1869, it is now necessary to explain how the present dispute has arisen. In 1939 there was enacted the United Provinces Tenancy Act, 1939. The preamble states " Whereas it is expedient to consolidate and amend the law relating to agricultural tenancies and other matters connected therewith in Agra and Oudh, it is hereby enacted as follows. " The Act is an elaborate measure consisting of 296 sections. Its general scope is sufficiently clear from the short title and preamble. It regulates and secures the rights of the tenants in various respects on lines sufficiently familiar in modern agricultural legislation. It is not contested that in doing so it impinges on the powers which, but for such a measure, the taluqdars might have exercised within their estates. What is claimed by the appellant is that the Act creates rights and interests in land in favour of other persons contrary to the sanad granted to the appellant (or his predecessor) by the Crown and thus derogates from the terms of the Crown grant, because it modifies or curtails the rights conferred by the Crown, It is not necessary to examine in detail the particulars set out in the plaint, and it has been conceded on behalf of the respondent that " some of the provisions ' of the Act do undoubtedly cut down the absolute rights claimed by the taluqdars to be comprised in the grant of their estates as evidenced by sanads such as we have set out above. " Their Lordships take the terms of this concession from the statement of its scope made by the Judges of the Federal Court and repeated before their Lordships. That relieves their Lordships from a precise consideration of what may have been the exact qualification of the taluqdars' rights embodied in the words of the sanad quoted above which aims at the protection of subordinate holders of the land. It is enough for present purposes to observe that some infringement of the rights of taluqdars under the sanad was in any event effected by the Act.