SHIVSINGH Vs. HARJIRAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution by Shivsingh against the opposite party Harjiram and the Board of Revenue praying that a writ of certiovari or any other writ, direction or order be issued against them and the decree passed by the Board of Revenue dated the 22nd April, 1955, for Rs. 375/be quashed.

(2.) THE facts leading to this revision may be shortly stated as follows. The petitioner is jagirdar of Nokha, Tehsil Nagaur, and the opposite party No. 1 harjiram was his tenant with respect to a field called Badi Jao situate in village nokha. Harjiram brought a suit against the petitioner on the ground that he had been unlawfully dispossessed of the said field by the latter in Smt. 2000 and thereby he was deprived of the mesne profits thereof amounting to Rs. 500/annually for the Samwat years 2000 and 2001. He also stated that he had filed a suit in the first instance in the Hasiat court on the 10th July, 1944, the jagir of Nokha being under the management of it, but the management of the Hasiat court came to an end during the pendency of the suit and, therefore, the plaint was returned to him on the 13th August, 1946, and in that litigation Harjiram alleges to have suffered considerable expense but he assessed it at Rs. 100/- only. Harjiram thus filed a suit for the recovery of Rs. 1100/-as compensation in the court of the Judicial Superintendent, Nagaur, on the 27th August, 1946. The petitioner resisted the suit and pleaded that Harjiram had cultivated the field in question from Smt. year 1991 to 1999 during the minority of the petitioner and had thereafter surrendered the field, and since then the petitioner was in actual cultivating possession of it. The petitioner also contended that Harjiram had filed a criminal complaint against the former under Sections 447 and 427, I. P. C. in respect of the field in question and that eventually that dispute was settled by compromise on the 12th August, 1944, according to which the petitioner gave another field called Kharchiawala to harjiram for three years. The petitioner also denied his liability to pay any damages to the opposite party. The Assistant Collector, Nagaur, to whom the case had in the meantime been transferred decreed the plaintiff's suit for Rs. 92/-as mesne profits. Both parties challenged the above decree in the court of the Additional Commissioner, Jodhpur, who allowed the appeal of the petitioner and dismissed Harjiram's suit by his order dated the 28th May, 1952. The latter then went in appeal to the Board of Revenue which allowed the appeal by its order dated the 7th January, 1954, and remanded the case to the Additional commissioner for fresh decision. Thereupon the Additional Commissioner by his judgment dated the 27th July, 1954, allowed the appeal of Harjiram and raised the amount of damages granted by the Assistant Collector, namely, Rs. 92/-to Rs. 520/ -. Thereupon both parties went to the Board of Revenue which by its judgment dated the 22nd April, 1955, partially allowed the appeal of the petitioner and reduced the decree passed by the court below to Rs. 375/- only and dismissed the cross-objection of Harjiram.

(3.) THE findings of the Board were briefly these. The Board was of opinion that the additional Commissioner had given no valid reasons for assessing the mesne profits at Rs. 520/- and that his finding in that respect was conjectural. The Board on a careful examination of the evidence led by the parties, came to the conclusion that the yield of the land was Rs. 35/- and Rs. 40/- respectively for the smt. years 2000 and 2001. Having come to this conclusion, the Board stated what the meaning of the expression ''compensation" was and relied on the decision of a learned Single judge of this Court in Bhawani Ram v. Ram Narain, 1955 Raj LW 112 (A), and then went on to hold that the opposite party was entitled to recover a sum of Rs. 100/- each under three heads, namely, 1. the value of the time spent in establishing the right violated, 2. the actual expense or costs of suit and 3. the mental suffering e. g. , vexation, anxiety and worry, and consequently awarded a sum of Rs. 300/- (in addition to mesne profits amounting to Rs. 75/-) as compensation to the opposite party Harjiram. In this view, the petitioner's appeal was partially allowed and the cross-objection of Harjiram was dismissed. The Board left both parties to bear their costs throughout. The petitioner has now come up to this Court by this writ petition.