MUSTAFA YAR KHAN Vs. ASGHARUNNISA BEGUM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Civil Revision Petition involves the determination of an important question of law. It is directed against the order of the Jagirdars' Debt Settlement Board passed on 20th June, 1956.

(2.) The respondent is the widow of late Moin Yar Khan, a jagirdar who died in 1950. By Regulation LXIX of I358-F. which came into effect in September 1949, all jagirs in the then State of Hyderabad were abolished and provision made for the payment to the Jagirdars and Hissedars out of the income on the jagirs thus abolished. This Regulation was followed by Regulation No. XXV of 1359 F., which provided for the termination of the interim allowance payable under the previous Regulation and for the fixation of the amount of compensation payable to the Jagirdars and Hissedars on account of such abolition, the sum so payable being called the " commutation sum ". In the year 1952, an Act entitled the Hyderabad Jagirdars Debt Settlement Act was passed for settlement of debts due by Jagirdars. Reference may also be made to the Hyderabad Atiyat Enquiries (Amendment) Act, 1956, by which the commutation sums payable under the Hyderabad Jagirs (Commutation) Regulation No. XXV of 1359-F.in respect of jagirs abolished under the Hyderabad (Abolition of Jagirs) Regulation (LXIX of 1358-F.), were brought within the definition of Atiyat grants dealt with by the Hyderabad Atiyat Enquiries Act, 1952.

(3.) On the death of Moin Yar Khan, there was litigation between the respondent his widow, and the petitioners who are his mother, brother and sisters. The respondent had, before the passing of the Hyderabad Jagirdars Debt Settlement Act, 1952, instituted a suit for mahar due from her deceased husband against the present petitioners in the City Civil Court claiming a sum of more than Rs. 2,00,000. This was transferred to the Jagirdars Debt Settlement Board under section 25 of the Hyderabad Jagirdars Debt Settlement Act, 1952. Prior to that transfer, when that suit was pending, the respondent had obtained an interim attachment of the commutation sum in the hands of the Jagir Administrator. The order of interim attachment granted by the City Civil Court was made final by the order of the Jagirdars ' Debt Settlement Board and it is this order that is now under attack. The contention for the petitioners is that this commutation sum which is payable according to the Regulation of 1359 F., (in accordance with the rules made by the local Government in exercise of the powers vested in it by section 7 of that Regulation) has the same character as the jagir in the hands of late Moin Yar Khan and that it cannot be treated as his property devolving in accordance with this personal law.