CHINATALAPATI VENKATANARASIMHARAJU (NOW MAJOR) Vs. SURISETTI RAMASWAMI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The question which has been referred reads as follows: Whether a person who is in the enjoyment of an easement, but who has not acquired a title to it by prescription or otherwise, can maintain an action to prevent its obstruction by any person other than the owner of the servient tenement?

(2.) The considerations which may apply when the interference complained of has reference to the access of light and air or to support from adjoining land may not apply when the interference has reference to the use of a way over another's land and as this reference arises out of a case relating to an alleged right of way we consider that the question should be re-framed in these terms: Can a person who has been using a particular way over land adjoining his, but for less than the prescriptive period, maintain an action to prevent a stranger from obstructing him using the way?

(3.) In Jootoor Acchanna V/s. Kanamala Venkatamma , a Bench of this Court (Collins, C. J., and Parker, J.) held that a plaintiff who had received light through a window opening on vacant ground, but had not enjoyed the light sufficiently long to acquire an easement, was entitled to an injunction against a person who was not the owner of the vacant land, restraining him from building on it so as to cause obstruction to the light. The Court said: It was not necessary for plaintiff to establish prescriptive rights of easement against a wrong doer and that the mere fact of plaintiff's enjoyment is sufficient to entitle him to an injunction.