OFFICIAL ASSIGNEE OF MADRAS Vs. BASUDEVADOSS BADRINARAYAN DOSS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) I am of the same opinion. I have had doubts in this case but the argument that concludes the matter to my mind is the fact which is known to every one familiar with these matters, viz., that, in many cases, the piece of paper which we call a patta is the only document that a ryot holds in respect of his; land, and that to say he cannot effect a valid equitable mortgage of that piece of paper, would be in effect to say that he could not equitably mortgage his land at all a result which I cannot believe to have been the desire of, or contemplated by, the framers of the Transfer of Property Act. I would rather wish to guard myself against the suggestion of my learned brother that, where a statute gives a definition for an instrument, that definition can be controlled by the understanding of the common people with regard to it, but I do not think that the decision of this case turns on that.

(2.) Finally, I have to say this. As this is a subject-matter with which I am very unfamiliar, I should require very grave reasons indeed to dissent from the opinion of two of my colleagues to whom the subject is familiar and who are acquainted with the land tenures of this Presidency in a way in which I cannot pretend to be.

(3.) I therefore agree in the result. Srinivasa Aiyangar, J.