DHANU PATHAH Vs. SONA KOERI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a Letters Patent appeal from a judgment of Mohammad Noor, J., in a suit to eject the defendant from a piece of land in Chota Nagpur on the allegation that he, the defendant, was an under-raiyat of the plaintiffs who were raiyats and that he did not vacate the land after the service of notice to quit.

(2.) The defence was that the plaintiffs representing themselves as tenure-holders had inducted the defendant on the land and had made a raiyati settlement thereof. The finding of the trial Court and the lower appellate Court was that the plaintiffs had in fact made the representation alleged. The defendant pleaded that the plaintiffs by reason of their representation, that they were tenure-holders, were estopped from denying that he was a raiyat. A plea of limitation was also raised on the basis that the defendant, whatever his position may have been at the inception of the tenancy, had acquired occupancy rights by adverse possession against the plaintiffs.

(3.) In the Record of Rights of 1910, the plaintiffs were undoubtedly recorded as raiyats. The settlement of the land with the defendant took place in 1908 or 1909 and the defendant was entered in the Record of Rights as a dar-raiyat. The defendant, however, paid rent as a raiyat and got receipts from the plaintiffs describing him as a raiyat. It is not denied that under the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act a raiyat cannot grant any permanent rights. The plaintiffs contend that the lease is void and the learned Judge of this Court has held that there cannot be any estoppel against the statute. There is an aspect of the matter, however, which does not seem to have been brought to the learned Judge's notice. Had the terms of the lease described the plaintiffs correctly as raiyats, the defendant could not have set up a plea that the plaintiffs were precluded from denying their title to confer a permanent right upon the defendant. This would have been a genuine case of an application of the principle that there cannot be an estoppel against a statute. In this case, however, the defendant denies that the plaintiffs are raiyats and alleged that they are, as represented by them, tenure-holders. This raises an issue of fact and it is not until that issue of fact is concluded in favour of the plaintiffs that any question of the operation of the statute can arise. It is true that the Record of Rights describes the plaintiffs as raiyats, but this is a piece of evidence only to which is attached the statutory presumption of correctness which is subject to rebuttal. The first issue, therefore, is as to whether the plaintiffs are or are not tenure-holders and it is at this stage that the doctrine of estoppel operates. The plaintiffs having represented themselves as tenure-holders cannot be permitted to enter into a discussion of this question of fact but must be held bound by their own representation. No question, therefore, of the operation of the statute can arise. The plaintiffs are prevented from proving the fact which is indispensable before the matter of the statute can be considered.