LOKNATH SINGH Vs. CHHOTAN BARHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by defendants first party against the decree dated 22nd December 1943 of the Additional Subordinate Judge, second Court, Patna, which affirmed the decree dated 22 February, 1943 of the Munsif of Barh. The dispute related to 247 acres land bearing survey plot No. 178, khata No. 590, in mouza Paighambarpur Sahri, touzi No. 5963. Mathura Das, defendant second party, is the 16 annas proprietor of the mouza. There was a proceeding under Section 144, Criminal P.C., on a trouble between the plaintiff and the defendants first party regarding possession over the land. That proceeding terminated in a favourable order for the defendants first party. The plaintiff instituted the suit on the allegation that in consequence of the adverse order in the said proceeding the defendants first party dispossessed him from the land. The plaintiff asked for a declaration of title and. recovery of possession. His case was that the land was settled with him by the proprietor by an unregistered patta dated 3lst October 1938, and he executed a registered kabuliyat in favour of the landlord on 1st November 1938 and from the date of settlement he had all along been in possession of the land until dispossession by the defendants first party on the strength of the order of the proceeding under Section 144, Criminal P.C. The defendants first party set up title to the land on the basis of a sada Hukumnama dated 3 June 1920, said to have been granted to the in by one Ram Parsad, mokhtaram of the proprietor. They asserted that from the date of settlement under the said Hukumnama they have all along been in possession of the land. Both the Courts found that the pattas and kabuliyats were genuine documents of bona fide transactions of settlement of the land with the plaintiff who had all along been in possession of the land from the time of the settlement until dispossession in consequence of an adverse order in the proceeding under Section 144, Criminal P.C. The Courts-further found that the Hukumnama relied upon by the defendant was a spurious document and that the defendant was not in possession of the land before. The contest between the parties is concluded by the above concurrent findings of fact of the Courts below.

(2.) It has been urged that in an action for ejectment the plaintiff, in order to succeed, must establish valid title to the property to evict the person in possession of it. It is said that in the present case the plaintiff bases his case of settlement of the land on an unregistered patta, which being a lease of an immovable property requires registration under the provision of Section 17, Registration Act, 1908. And Section 49 of the Act provides that no document required by Section 17 to be registered shall affect any immovable property comprised therein or be received as evidence of any transaction affecting such property. Therefore, the plaintiff did not acquire any valid title to the land. In support of this contention reference is made to the decision in Janki Kuer V/s. Birj Bhikhan Ojha A.I.R. 1924 Pat. 641 and Ramautar Singh V/s. Juthi Patna (37) 18 P.L.T. 1012. The latter case followed the former. The former case is an authority for the proposition that an agricultural lease which has been reduced to writing requires to be registered under Section 17, Registration Act, 1908, and if the document is not registered it can not under Section 49 be received in evidence of the lease, and in such a case Section 91, Evidence Act, debars other evidence of the lease being given. But in the same case his Lordship Dawson-Miller C.J. with whom Mullick J. agreed further laid down: If the subsequent acts of the parties themselves disclose a state of affairs consistent only with the existence of an agreement mutually recognized and acted upon as if the instrument were binding, then, although the written document may be defective as a valid and finally concluded agreement such defects may be supplied by the subsequent actings and conduct of the parties.

(3.) In that case the question for determination was the status of the respondent in regard to seven bighas land. In the record of rights he was recorded as a tenant at a fixed rent, while the appellant (landlord) contended that he was an occupancy raiyat of the land. The respondent relied upon a sanad dated 1882. Their Lordships held that the document was not a valid instrument in proof of finally concluded agreement, nevertheless it was admissible for a collateral purpose, e.g., to show the nature of the defendant's possession. It was pointed out that an agricultural lease of an immovable property need not be in writing: It may be effected by oral agreement in which case no question of registration arises and the lease may be proved in the same way as any other verbal agreement, and even documentary evidence may be admissible in support of the oral agreement.