KARSAN SADASHIV PATIL Vs. GATLU SHIVAJI PATIL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This suit was instituted by the plaintiffs for an account of what was due upon a partnership between them and the defendants in respect of a certain liquor-selling business.

(2.) The business of selling liquor in the Bombay Presidency is regulated by the provisions of the Abkari Act, Bombay Act V of 1878. It is provided by Section 16 that "except as is hereinafter otherwise provided, no liquor and no intoxicating drug shall be sold without a license or pass from the Collector." Section 43 imposes penalties upon whomsoever in contravention of the Act or of any rule or order made under the Act or of any license obtained under the Act sells liquor.

(3.) Now the license under the Act was obtained by the defendant No. 1. It has many conditions expressed in it but the only material one for the purpose of this suit is condition No. 19 which provides:-" The licensee shall not sell, transfer to any person or sublet his right to sell country liquor obtained under the license, and shall enter into no Kabulayat or agreement for the exercise of the said right which, in the opinion of the Collector, is in the nature of a sub-lease." By the preamble of the license the licensee was given, subject to the conditions expressed subsequently, an exclusive right to sell country-liquor in the shop at Nawapur or in the group or groups of shops mentioned in Schedule B for a period of one year from the 1st of April 1904-