NATHU Vs. TULSI RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The defendants-appellants are residents of a village called Chibli in the Farrukhabad District.

(2.) It appears, as far as I can ascertain, that the Zemindars of this village were a certain Nawab Shams-ul-nissa Begam, Baba Piyare Das, Rangi Lal and some others. In 1914 Nawab Shams-ul-nissa Begam brought a suit against the defendants-appellants in which she asked for their ejectment from a compound in the village on the ground that they had no right there. The suit was dismissed by the Munsif on the ground that the land was part of the abadi and that the defendants had been in possession of the compound for a very long time more than 12 years before the suit. The Distriot Judge on appeal decreed the suit, but the High Court in second appeal dismissed it. The judgment of the High Court is in second appeal No. 797 of 1916 and is dated 12 July 1917. Piyare Das and Rangi Lal were proforma defendants in that suit. Now, it appears that on the 22nd August 1913 Pyare Das and Rangi Lal had sold rights in the compound in question to Tulshi Ram and others, the plaintiffs-respondents in the present suit, and by virtue of the sale deed in their favour these plaintiffs-respondents have instituted an exaotly similar suit against the defendants-appellants for their ejectment out of the same compound. The present appeal arises out of that suit. The Munsif, adopting the view that the plaintiffs-respondents had no right, dismissed the suit but the learned Distriot Judge has taken a different view. He has allowed the plaintiffs a decree for joint possession and has ordered the enclosuref wall to be removed. The defendants come here in appeal.

(3.) The decision in the previous suit, of course, does not operate as res judicata and it may be said that it has practically no bearing on the present suit. Whether it is desirable that in a case in which a village is owned by a large number of proprietors one proprietor after another should be permitted to bring a suit on exactly the same cause of action against the same people is not for me to decide here. Such is the law in India and it does not follow that after the decision of this suit the point may not be raised again by somebody else in a third suit.