GOPAL CHANDRA BANERJEE Vs. MOHAMMAD SOLEMAN MULLICK

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal by the defendants, the tenants, from the decision of the learned Special Judge of Hooghly affirming the decision of the Assistant Settlement Officer. The suit was brought by the plaintiff for enhancement of rent. The tenants gave in evidence rent receipts which have been accepted by the Judge, proving that rent had been paid at a uniform rate for a period exceeding twenty years. So that the presumption was that the tenants held the land without being liable to have their rent increased, unless and until the landlord showed something to the contrary. The question is: "Has the landlord shown something to the contrary?" The learned Judge has not approached the case from that view. He says that the tenants do not show that they represent the persons who were formerly in possession of the land. The tenants case was that the persons who were formerly in possession were their benamdars. The learned Judge says that be cannot accept that case. But the learned Judge had got to see whether the landlord had shows that these persons who were formerly on the land were not the predecessors of the defendants, when once the defendants had alleged and produced in support of their allegation rent receipts covering a period of over twenty years, showing that they paid rent at a uniform rate for that period. The defendants, having given that evidence, can rest on that evidence until the landlord displaces the presumption. The learned Judge has not decided the case from that view. The case must, therefore, go back to the lower Appellate Court to be re-heard by the learned Special Judge. Costs will abide the result of the re hearing by the Court of Appeal below.