MUKUNDKRISHNA GOVINDKRISHNA Vs. MOHANLAL PARVATISHANKAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiff sued to recover Rs. 12,390 odd and costs of the suit on the strength of a deed of mortgage dated November 20, 1884. He also prayed that if default of payment were made he should be allowed to recover the amount by sale. A deeree was passed in favour of the plaintiff that the defendant should pay the mortgage amount, and in default the pro-perty should be sold.

(2.) The defendant has appealed. The first objection is that the lower Court erred in holding that he was not an agriculturist. He is a sharer in the Jahagir of the village under a Sanad Exhibit 71 which had already been the subject-matter for interpretation in a proceeding between the present parties in a suit filed by the Jahagirdars against the Secretary of State. Unfortunately, that suit was filed in the Second Class Subordinate Judge's Court, and consequently the question decided there could not be res judicata in this suit.

(3.) Now it is clear that the defendant's income was partly due to the assessment of the village and partly due to what he earned from the inhere land and from various lands that had lapsed to the Jahagirdars. We think that the income derived from the assessment is not agricultural income. By the definition in Section 2 the Dekkhan Agriculturists Relief Act, "Agriculturist" shall be taken to mean a person, who by himself, or by his servants or by his tenants earns his livelihood wholly or principally by agriculture. Under Explanation (b) an assignee of Government assessment or a mortgagee is not as such an agriculturist within this definition.