KHUSHALBHAI TRIKAMBHAI Vs. SECRETARY OF STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiffs filed Suit No. 21 of 1913 in the District Court of Ahmedabad on behalf of themselves and the people of the village of Nawagam, Taluka Matar, District Kaira, against the Secretary of State for India. This village is situated on the bank of the Khari river which rises near the village of Amnagar in the Idar State. By their plaint the plaintiffs claim that they, together with the inhabitants of the other villages, are entitled to the use of all the water necessary in the Khari river from its source up to their lands for the purpose of irrigation and for all their other necessities by virtue of an arrangement made between them and Government in 1843.

(2.) Disputes had arisen with regard to the mode and the terms of enjoyment of the preferential rights to the water, which were referred to the arbitration of the Mamlatdar and certain other gentlemen who prepared a statement or Kalambandhi of the rules regarding the mode and the terms for the enjoyment of the water by the said eleven villages which were thereafter called the Kalambandhi villages. In 1881, Government constructed a canal, known as the Khari Cut, to the north of the said villages to convey flood waters to the Chandola Tank. The plaintiffs also alleged that the current of the Khari river was fed by the Bhujva rivulet on this side of Amnagar and by the natural currents of the Bokhs of Prantij, and the Hatbmati, and claim that they have preferential rights to all this water as accretion to the Khari river from ancient times. When the plaintiffs had occasion to complain to Government that the waters of the Khari river were being conveyed to the Chandola Tank, they were assured that their rights were being preserved and only superfluous water was allowed to be conveyed to the Chandola Tank.

(3.) In 1899-1900, Government expanded the Chandola irrigation system and constructed a large reservoir near the village of Limla on the Hathmati canal to which they conveyed the waters of the Bokhs of Prantij and the Bhujva current mentioned above, thereby, so the plaintiff's allege, diminishing the water of the Khari river. When the villagers complained, the Government officers either asserted that their rights were not being interfered with, or allowed the water to flow in the Khari river according to their requirements. Still the plaintiffs complain that the now of water has been improperly diverted so that for the years 1912-13 and for several previous years their crops had been destroyed entirely.