NAGA MANJHI Vs. KINI MAHATANI ANR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This suit was begun in the Munsif's Court at Raghunathpur in the district of Manbhum in relation to certain lands to which the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act applies. The plaintiff was the widow of one Kanta Mahato, a Kurmi Mahato, and the defendants were, as to some of them, the superior landlords under whom she said she held the land as a raiyat and as to the other part the persons whom she said were inducted upon the land as under-raiyats by her. As was her duty in her plaint she set forth the facts which she considered entitled her to relief at the hands of the Court. The Court did not give her the whole of the relief which she asked for but gave the relief which in its opinion she was entitled, on the proof of those facts, to receive.

(2.) She said that as regards the under-raiyat defendants they had denied that they were under-raiyats at all, that they claimed to be raiyats themselves and that in so far as the payment of rent was concerned they would pay the rent to the defendant superior landlords. Furthermore the plaintiff alleged that the defendant not content with denying her title both as a raiyat under the superior landlords and as a raiyat towards them as under-raiyats with the right to receive rent, had also declined in fact to pay any rent and had not paid any rent. She in fact suggested in her plaint that the remedies to which she was entitled was a declaration of her raiyati holding and further the eviction of the under-raiyats from cultivating possession of the land, and she also made the usual and proper application for any other relief to which in the opinion of the Court the establishment of facts pleaded by her should entitle her.

(3.) The issues were decided by the Munsif and ultimately decided on appeal by the District Judge from whose decision this appeal is preferred and the effect of the decision is this: firstly it is said that in so far as the claim for possession is concerned, inasmuch as the plaintiff herself had established that the relationship between herself and the under-raiyats being that of landlord and tenant and inasmuch as the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act gave to the revenue Courts exclusive jurisdiction in claims by a landlord to evict his tenant that the Court had no power to grant the relief by way of eviction. Furthermore the Court proceeded to deal with the fact held by it that the under-raiyats had been in actual possession of the land for a very long time and for the reasons set forth, which are ample in mp opinion, declined to give the relief of forfeiture.