VELU PILLAI Vs. SECRETARY OF STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This suit relates to an inani granted for the support of the piper of a temple at Madura. Defendant 12 held the office until 1892, when he was dismissed. Plaintiff 1 was then appointed by the trustee of the temple and held office until 1914. After him plaintiff 3 held office for about two years; and since 1916, about three months after plaintiff 2 came into office, the Government resumed the inam, granted pattas for the inam lands to the persons in possession of it and ordered that the assessment collected on the land should be paid to the piper office for the time being as long he did his work satisfactorily. In this suit plaintiffs 1 to 3 pray for a declaration that the transfer of the land by the Government from inam to ayan is illegal and invalid and for the recovery of the land from the defendants in possession. The suit was dismissed by the District Munsif. Plaintiff 1 died while the suit was before the District Munsif. Plaintiffs 2 and 3 appealed; but the Subordinate Judge confirmed the District Munsif's decree. Plaintiffs 2 and 3 again appeal.

(2.) The extract from the inam register of 1883, contained in Ex. 12, shows that the inam was a permanent hereditary grant and that it was then confirmed under Rule 3 (1), Inam Rules, [R. 3 (2) appears to be a misprint] that is, it was to be continued so long as the service continued to be performed, according to the conditions of the grant. It appears that defendant 12 alienated the whole of the inam land and it has been found that plaintiff 1 was never in possession in any way during the 22 years he held the office from 1892 to 1914, nor has either plaintiff 2 or plaintiff 3 ever been in possession. It is contended for the plaintiffs that the resumption of the inam by the Government in 1916 was illegal, because though the office- holders were out of possession of the inam land, the piping service was being done. The argument is that it is no concern of the Government who gets the benefit of the inam or who does the piping service; so long as the service is done satisfactorily by anyone in the world, the Government cannot resume the inam. Two cases are quoted in support of this position, viz., Shankarlal V/s. Secy. of State [1919] 43 Bom. 583 and the Secy. of State V/s. Gulam Mahboob Khan Sahib [1919] 42 Mad. 673, The Bombay case is not similar to this case and turned on the construction of a Bombay Act and of the sanad concerned. In Secy. of State v. Gulam Mahboob Khan Sahib [1919] 42 Mad. 673, it was found that the objects of the trust were being substantially carried out with the income of the trust property and that, therefore, the resumption of the inam on account of some alienation was unjustifiable. In the present case no part of the income of the inam land had been devoted to the object of the grant for at least 24 years before the resumption. Plaintiff 2, during the whole period he was piper, got his remuneration, not from the inam land, but from a salary paid to him by the temple trustee, and so did plaintiffs. Plaintiff 2, it appears, has received also the assessment on the inam land since its resumption by the Government, who acted in the matter not for their own benefit but in the interests of the office. The motives of the Government in making the resumption, however, do not affect the legality or illegality of their action. But I agree with the learned Government Pleader that, when the Government found that for a long period the inam land had been entirely dissociated from the office for the support of which it had been granted and that no part of the income of the land was going towards the remuneration of the office- holder, which had to be provided otherwise by the temple trustee, the service " did not continue to be performed according to the conditions of the grant within the meaning of Rule 3 (1) of the Inam Rules. It is to that rule that the plaintiffs appeal, and it is not necessary for me to consider the force or validity of the Board's Standing Order 54. I agree with the finding of the lower Courts that the resumption of the inam was not illegal.

(3.) That is enough to dispose of this appeal. But I may mention that plaintiff 1, for whom no representative had been brought on record, appears to have had no right to maintain this suit as he was out of office long before the suit was instituted. Moreover, it appears that, though he belonged to the inamdar family, he was not the next in succession to defendant 12, and did not succeed to the office but was appointed to it by the temple trustee; and apart from that it also appears that it was at his instance that the resumption proceedings were started. Plaintiff 3 was out of office before the suit was instituted and it is not now suggested that he had any right to maintain it. The suit is now pressed only for plaintiff 2. He is connected with plaintiff 1, by having married plaintiff 1's brother's granddaughter but does not appear to belong in any way to the inamdar family. Exhibit N shows that he was appointed by the temple trustee on probation in August 1916 and was confirmed in April 1917. He has no claim to hold the office by hereditary right and for that reason alone cannot maintain this suit. Apart from that the plaint shows that plaintiffs 2 and 3 professed to base their right on a will and settlement and other documents executed and left in their favour by plaintiff 1," which could have given them no such right. None of the plaintiffs, therefore, had any right to maintain the suit.