SRIMAT SREE VIDYA SANKARA BHARATH SWAMIVARU, TRUSTEE OF SRI CHANDRAMOULESWARA SWAMIVARU OF PUSHPAGIRI MUTT, REPRESENTED BY POWER OF ATTORNEY AGENT, E SITARAMAYYA Vs. POPURI RAMAMURTHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These three appeals have been preferred by the landholder, which is the Pushpagiri Mutt, against an order of the Subordinate Judge directing the plaints to be returned for presentation to the Revenue Court as the lands in respect of which the suits have been brought form part of an "estate."

(2.) Both the Courts have held that the Lingamguntla Agraharam in which the lands are situated is an "estate." The District Munsiff dismissed the suits on this finding but the Subordinate Judge directed the plaints to be returned, which, of course, is the proper order to make, if the finding is correct.

(3.) It is contended for the appellant that as the grant to the mutt was not of an entire village, but only of part of a village, there having been minor inams at the time which were not subject-matter of the grant, the agraharam cannot be called an "estate" within the meaning of the Act and according to the decisions of this Court. It is to meet these decisions that legislation was undertaken and Madras Act II of 1945 came to be passed amending the Madras Estates Land Act, 1908, and enacting in Explanation 1 to Clause (d) of Sub-section (2) of Section 3 that the "area which forms the subject-matter of the grant shall be deemed to be an estate notwithstanding that it did not include certain lands in the village which have already been granted on service or other tenure or been reserved for communal purposes" and providing that the amendment "shall be deemed to have had effect as from the date on which the Madras Estates Land (Third Amendment) Act, 1936, came into force." Therefore the point that the grant was not of the entire village and it did not include certain lands which formed part of the village is of no avail to the appellant, unless he is able to steer clear of this legislation.