GOVINDASAMI NAIDU Vs. ETHIRAJAMMAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The first finding of the learned District Judge is that the two persons who granted the earlier lease to the plaintiff were in fact the dharmakartas of the temple and the 2nd defendant had no right to grant the subsequent lease relied on by the defendants. That finding is conclusive.

(2.) It is next argued that the document relied on by the plaintiff is not a lease at all but a license; and the learned Judge has found that the lease is terminable at the option of the lessor. It is a mistake. The lease is terminable only at the option of the lessee, the plaintiff, and enures to her benefit so long as she is able and willing to perform the services for which she was given the lease.

(3.) The last ground taken is that the defendant, having in good faith spent money in building a house on the suit site, ought not to be ejected except on terms of the 1st defendant being paid compensation. How far the Indian Law has gone on this matter, it is not necessary to decide. At any rate, it is clear that no such claim for compensation can be made except in the case of fraud, namely, if the persons really entitled knew that they were entitled and the persons in actual possession were not, and stood by and allowed them to spend money in building on the land. That I say is an allegation of fraud. Even if that be not cause of action in this country, it is in England. No case of this kind is made either in the pleadings or set out in the issue and I think it is the settled practice of every Court that an allegation of fraud must be made definitely and categorically and must, in no circumstances, be allowed to be made at a subsequent stage of the suit.