SITA RAM Vs. NARSHING DASS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This second appeal is directed against the concurrent decisions of the Courts below dismissing the plaintiffs' suit.

(2.) The plaintiffs, thirty-one in number, alongwith Kishori Lal and Krishan, defendants 8 and 9, are proprietors of agricultural land situate in Nagla Nangran, tehsil Thanesar in the district Karnal. Defendants 1 to 7 were occupancy tenants in the said village before the enforcement of the Punjab Occupancy Tenants (Vesting of Proprietary Rights) Act, 1953, in an area measuring 139 Bighas 13 Biswas. The village in question is situated on the bank of river Jamuna and is subject to river action from time to time. This village had an area measuring 1768 Bighas 2 Biswas as Shamilat. The measure of division of the Shamilat was "hasab rased khewat". Reference may be made to the revenue record of the year 1887. A mutation was entered at the instance of the proprietors on 29th of August, 1887 wherein the proprietors changed the measure of ownership in the Shamilat. Instead of "hasab rasad khewat" the measure was converted into "munqasam bees biswas", that is, the entire Shamilat was to be notionally treated as 20 Biswas and divided according to the shares of the proprietors held in the proprietary holdings. It is also significant that after 1887, that is, after this mutation, the land all through continued to be described as Shamilat Deh. As a matter of fact, in the Wajib-ul-Arz of the village that was prepared in the Settlement of 1908-09 (Exhibit P. 10), it was clearly specified that the measure of enjoyment in the village Shamilat was 20 Biswas regarding which the entry is made under the pedigree-table.

(3.) The present suit was brought by the plaintiffs claiming a declaration that they were the exclusive owners of the Shamilat about which a reference has been made earlier, and that defendants 1 to 7 had nothing to do with it. A permanent injunction was claimed restraining defendants 1 to 7 from interferring with the rights of ownership and possession of the plaintiffs. A consequential relief was also claimed that a decree, wherein the rights of defendants 1 to 7 in this Shamilat had been declared in the year 1964 and affirmed in appeal in 1965, was not binding on the plaintiffs, the reason being that only defendants 8 and 9 were parties to that decree and not the plaintiffs. Defendants 8 and 9 were not sued in their representative capacity as representing the entire proprietary body, the effect being that the plaintiffs were not represented at all in that litigation.