TRIBENI PD BHAGAT Vs. SOHRAI URAON

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiffs second appeal from the concurrent decisions of the Courts below dismissing their suit for possession on the basis that the disputed revisional survey plot No. 1312 with an area of 72 acres is their Manjhihas land. The plaintiffs are proprietors of the village where the land in dispute is situate, to the extent of 10 annas 8 pies share. Their case was that by virtue of a private partition amongst the co-sharer proprietors this plot was allotted to the plaintiffs share. It is further alleged that this plot belonged to that category of the privileged lands of the proprietors in which no occupancy or non-occupancy rights can be acquired in any circumstances. The plaintiffs wanted to bring the land in their khas cultivation but the defendants did not give up possession, hence the suit. The defendants contested the Suit on the ground that they had been in possession for more than twelve years as raiyats and had thus acquired permanent rights in the land which entitled them to retain possession. Both the Courts below have taken the view that the land belongs to the category of landlords privileged lands but that the plaintiffs had failed to prove that the disputed land fell under the category of Manjhihas land as contemplated in Section 118(1)(b), of the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act. In that view of the matter they have agreed in dismissing the plaintiffs suit, hence this second appeal.

(2.) The learned Counsel for the appellants has contended and, in my opinion, rightly, that the Courts below have misdirected themselves in holding that the disputed land did not appertain to the category of proprietor's privileged land as contemplated in Section 118(1)(b), Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act. It is common ground that the defendants have been in possession of the land in dispute for many years much more than twelve years. It is also noteworthy that in the two successive records of rights prepared under the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act the land has been described as Manjhihas but in possession of the defendants or their ancestors. In the Guide and Glossary to the Survey and Settlement Operations in the Chota Nagpur Division it has been stated at page 37 that the term Manjhihas means landlords privileged lands surveyed and demarcated under Chota Nagpur Tenures Act of 1863 (a mistake for 1869). They are at the absolute disposal of the landlord and no right of occupancy or even of non-occupancy can accrue in them in any circumstances" (1939 edition).

(3.) It will further be noticed that in none of these entries in the records of rights have the defendants or their ancestors been recorded as having occupancy or non- occupancy rights in the plot in question. If the land belonged to the category of proprietors private lands as contemplated in Section 118(1)(a), ordinarily the entry in the record of rights would have been not Manjhihas but zirat (or some such synonymous term) Dakhalkar or Ghair Dakhalkar. The Courts below have made a mistake of not referring to the Survey and Settlement Guide and Glossary referred to above which makes it clear that the entry Manjhihas in the two records of rights would not have been there if the land did not answer the description of proprietors private land as contemplated in Section 118(1)(b), Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act. I have no doubt, in my mind, that if the Courts below had made a reference to the Guide and Glossary referred to above, they would not have insisted upon the plaintiff producing the record of 1869 in proof of the fact that the disputed land belonged to the category of Manjhihas referred to in Clause (b) of Section 118. In this connection reference may also be made to the Survey and Settlement Glossary where the term zirat has been explained at page 45 as "Privileged land as defined in Section 118, Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act". It follows, therefore, that foe term zirat is a general term including all kinds of proprietors privileged lands; whereas the term Manjhihas has a special significance, with particular reference to Section 118(1)(b), Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act. If as found by the Courts below the defendants were in possession of the disputed land for many more than twelve years and if it were a land of the description of mere zirat as distinguished from Manjhihas, the survey entry would have been to the effect that the defendants had acquired occupancy or non-occupancy rights therein, But no such entry is found in the cadastral or in the revisional survey record of rights.