HUKMA Vs. PISHORI LAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiff-pre-emptor's appeal against the judgment and decree dated 26.7.69 passed by the Additional District Judge, Jullundur, which arises out of a suit for possession whereby he sought to possess the suit land by pre-empting the sale on the ground of his enjoying superior right of pre-emption being tenant of the vendor on the suit land on the date of the sale of the land by the vendor, Kharaiti Lal, to the defendant-respondents. The vendees defendant-respondents resisted the suit and denied the plaintiff's claim to be the tenant of the vendor and on these pleadings of the parties, the trial Court framed the following issues -

(2.) On an appeal, the lower appellate Court reversed the finding of the trial Court on issue No. 1 by holding that the plaintiff pre-emptor was not the tenant on the land at the relevant time and in view of this finding, it accepted the appeal and dismissed the suit of the plaintiff-pre-emptor. Hence this regular second appeal at the instance of the plaintiff-pre-emptor in this Court.

(3.) The lower appellate Court held that the plaintiff pre-emptor was not a tenant on the land on the ground that the documentary evidence, that has been placed on the record in the form of Jamabandi and Khasra Girdawari, Exhibits P.1 and P.2 respectively, did not show that, in fact, he was paying any rent to the vendor. In the Single Bench decision of this Court reported in Maman Singh V. The Resident Magistrate, Gohana and others,1965 PunLR 161 (and the view expressed therein was affirmed by a Division Bench in Letters Patent Appeal reported in Bhartu and another V. Maman Singh,1966 PunLR 369), which was followed by the trial Court in this case, the view expressed was that it is not enough for a person, desiring to prove himself to be a tenant-at-will, to show that in the revenue records he is recorded as a tenant-at-will, because that is the kind of entry which the revenue staff frequently makes whenever it finds a person, other than the landlord, in possession of the agricultural land and, therefore, to decide as to whether a person in cultivating possession is a tenant, one should look for the rent payable by him, mentioned in the column of rent in the revenue record concerned. In that case, the entry in the column of 'lagan' was 'bila lagan bawaja kabza sabka' and the legal inference drawn from this entry was that the person concerned was not a tenant.