KASINATH DAS Vs. NISAKAR ROUT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiffs,--certain town living absentee landlords in respect of their village lands in the country side,--are the appellants in this First Appeal from a decision of the learned Subordinate Judge, Cuttack, whereby he dismissed the plaintiffs' suit for a declaration that the defendants, who claim to be Bhagachasis of the suit lands, have no right, title and interest therein, and that they are mere trespassers, for recovery of possession and mesne profits for the sum of Rs. 2493/-from the defendants, on the allegation that the defendants are trespassers, in the circumstances hereinafter stated.

(2.) The facts--few and simple--are these. The suit lands are 13.16 acres in area spread over in different villages. The plaintiffs claim the suit lands as owners in possession. It is said that the defendants encroached upon the said lands, taking advantage of the plaintiffs' absence from the village. The plaintiffs are members of a joint Hindu family and are residents of Cuttack Town; they are absentee landlords in respect of the disputed lands. The plaintiffs had kept a servant one Guri Ghadei who is said to have been looking after cultivation of the disputed lands. The defendants 2 to 19 are said to have been engaged labourers on daily wages for harvesting the lands with ploughs and bullocks belonging to the plaintiffs under the supervision of the said Guri Ghadei. In 1952, the said Guri Ghadei died. Thereafter, as the plaintiffs' case is, the defendants 1 and 2 (two influential men of the locality), along with defendants 3 to 19, are said to have unlawfully and forcibly cultivated the suit lands and appropriated the crops without any authority of the plaintiffs. The defendants asserted their alleged right as Bhagachasis in respect of the disputed lands, although, according to the plaintiffs, there was no relationship of landlord and tenant between the parties. The plaintiffs' case is that they never inducted the defendants as tenants for cultivating the lands on bhag or any other rental system; that therefore no relationship of landlord and tenant as alleged exists; that apparently, after the death of Guri Ghadei and taking advantage of the absence from the village of the plaintiffs as absentee landlords, the defendants took wrongful possession of the disputed lands and appropriated the crops thereof for which they are liable to pay mesne profits to the extent of Rs. 2493/- as claimed with future mesne profits until delivery of possession. The plaintiffs filed the suit on October 2.1, 1955 for reliefs as aforesaid.

(3.) The defence, taken in the suit, was that defendants 2 to 4, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 19 had no connection with the disputed lands and that they have been unnecessarily impleaded in the suit; that the other defendants are Bhagachasis, in respect of the suit lands, regularly paying Rajbhag to the agent of the plaintiffs; that schedule A, given at the foot of the written statement, shows different portions of the lands in cultivating possession of the defendant Bhagchasis and also the period for which each of the Bhagchasis, is in possession of his portion; that as Bhagchasis they are protected against eviction by the plaintiffs; that the plaintiffs knowing fully the existing law that they will not be able to evict the defendant Bhagchasis, have filed this suit with a false plea that the defendants are mere trespassers. This, in substance, is the defence stand resisting the plaintiff's claim for eviction of the defendants, from the suit lands.