BAIJNATH MANDAR Vs. RAM ADHIN RAY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) It is better in this case to refer to the cross-appeals with which I propose to deal at once by their numbers. They are 1166 and 1167, and in support of these appeals it is contended by Mr. Jha that his clients having purchased the jote rights, although they were merely co-sharers, were purchasers on behalf of their whole body of co-sharers and consequently the learned Judge in the Court below was: wrong in allowing the plaintiffs (appellants of that Court) to retain six annas interest. Reliance is placed on a passage in the well-known case of Midnapur Zamindary Co. Ltd. V/s. Naresh Narayan Roy AIR 1924 PC 144. The passage in the opinion of Sir John Edge was this: Even if the Midnapur Company purchased any jote rights in lands held in common by the co-sharers, such a purchase would in law be held to have been a purchase for the benefit of all the co-sharers, and the jote rights so purchased would by the purchase be extinguished.

(2.) In my judgment if the learned Judge in the Court below was right on the main question, then it seems to me that Mr. Jha's cross-appeals must succeed. I now come to the main appeals in which Mr. Jayaswal appears for the appellants. They are appeals Nos. 988 and 989. They are appeals by the plaintiff who had purchased what were held to be non-transferable holdings from the defendant second party. The plaintiff in the other suit, who is also an appellant in the other appeal, purchased from the plaintiff in the first main appeal a part of that holding. It is clear therefore that the decision of one decides the other. The principal defendant who is respondent before me was the co-sharer landlord as I have already indicated.

(3.) It has been held by the Court below that Mr. Jayaswal's client purchased this non-transferable holding in the year 1903 and since that date was in possession and in the latter respect the judgment of the Subordinate Judge in appeal differs from the judgment of the trial Court. The defendant in answer to the claim which was brought by the plaintiff in this action set up amongst other defences the plea that the holding which the plaintiff purchased was not transferable. The defendants being co-sharers there was an action for rent against their tenants who were defendants second party and the vendors of the plaintiff and eventually obtained a decree which has been held to be, and there is no dispute about this matter, a money decree and not a rent decree.