PUNJAB PROVINCE Vs. DAULAT SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal from the judgment and order of the Federal Court of India, dated May 8, 1942, by which the judgment and decree of the High Court of Judicature at Lahore, dated February 27, 1941, dismissing appeals by the appellant and respondents Nos. 2 and 3 respectively from the judgment and decree of the Subordinate Judge, IV Class, Sialkot, dated July 22, 1940, 'were set aside and the case sent back to the High Court with a direction for the framing of proper issues and the remittal of the case to the trial Court for further trial and decision.

(2.) THE only question in this appeal is whether, and, if so, to what extent, Section 5 of the Punjab Alienation of Land (Second Amendment) Act, 1938, Punjab Act X of 1938, is rendered invalid by Section 298 of the Government of India Act, 1935, as being ultra vires of the Punjab Provincial Legislature. THE Punjab Act of 1938, which may be conveniently referred to as the impugned Act, by Section 5 purported to insert a new Section 13a in the Punjab Alienation of Land Act, 1900 (Indian Act XIII of 1900), which may be referred to as the principal Act, the new section being expressly given retrospective effect.

(3.) PERHAPS the most important section of the principal Act for present purposes is Section 4, under which the Local Government, for which the Provincial Government was substituted in 1937, were, by notification in the Official Gazette, to determine what bodies of persons in any district or group of districts were to be deemed to be agricultural tribes or groups of agricultural tribes for the purposes of the Act. Accordingly, by Punjab Government Notification No.63, dated April 18, 1904, it was determined that for the purpose of the Act (1) In each district of the Punjab mentioned in column 1 of the Schedule attached to this notification, all persons either holding land or ordinarily residing in such district and belonging to any one of the tribes mentioned opposite the name of such district, in column 2, shall be deemed to be an " agricultural tribe " within the district. (2) All the ' agricultural tribes' within any one district shall be deemed to be a group of agricultural tribes.