MANAVIKRAMAN TIRUMALPAD Vs. COLLECTOR OF THE NILGIRIS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Under Section 54 of the Land Acquisition Act, an appeal from the award of the District Court of Coimbatore was heard by a Bench consisting of Ayling and Sadasiva Ayyar, JJ., Both the learned Judges differed, generally speaking, from the Land Acquisition Judge and among themselves on some questions relating to the principle on which the value of the property was to be assessed. The total amount claimed by the owner was eight lakhs. The Land Acquisition Judge, confirming the valuation of the Collector, made an award of one lakh and seventy-two thousand rupees in round figures. Ayling, J., on the basis on which he proceeded held that the amount of the award should be enhanced by Rs. 7,000 and Sadasiva Ayyar, J., on the method of valuation adopted by him was for awarding on the whole an additional sum of about Us. 56,000. We understand that a question was then raised before the learned Judges as to what should be the order of the High Court under such circumstances. The learned Judges thereupon agreed upon the order in the appeal being that the decree of the District Judge should be modified by adding Rs. 8,050 to the award. In other words, they thought that that was the least amount to which the appellant was entitled, as that was the additional amount, which Ayling, J., wanted to award, and, according to Sadasiva Ayyar, J., the appellant was entitled to something more and not less.

(2.) The appeal before us is filed under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent and the preliminary objection taken is that no such appeal is allowed by the law. That depends upon whether the decision of the High Court in an appeal under Section 54 of the Land Acquisition Act can be said to be a "judgment" within the meaning of Clause 15 of the Letters Patent. It seems to me that the matter is not involved in any doubt in view of the decision of the Privy Council in Rangoon Botatoung Company Ld. v. The Collector, Rangoon (1913) I.L.R., 40 Calc., 21 (P.C.) and the judgment at the Bombay High Court in The Special Officer, Salsette Building Sites v. Dossabhai Bezonji (1913) I.L.R., 87 Bom., 506 confirmed as it was by the Privy Council as reported in The Special Officer, Salsette Building Sites v. Dassabhai Basanji Motiwala (1913) 17 C.W.N., 421 (P.C.). In the first case, their Lordships described an award made under the Land Acquisition Act as "the determination of arbitrators as to the value of land" taken for public purposes; and upon that ground they refused to accept the argument that once the claimant is admitted to the High Court as appellant under Section 54 of the Act, he has all the rights of an ordinary suitor including the right to carry the award up to the Board as if it were a decree of the High Court made in the exercise of its ordinary civil jurisdiction. It will be seen from the report of the argument of Buckmaster, K.C., the present Lord Chancellor, that almost his whole argument against the maintainability of the appeal was based on the use of the word "award" in the Act. His contention was that the legislature wanted the determination of the land acquisition tribunal to be distinguished from an "order" or "decree" of an ordinary civil Court.

(3.) In the case in the Bombay High Court the learned Judges had to consider whether Clause 39 of the Letters Patent of the Bombay High Court, which is in the same language as Clause 39 of the Letters Patent of the Madras High Court, allowed an appeal to the Privy Council; for no arguments were or could have been based in the Rangoon Company s case on any such clause as the Chief Court of Lower Burma was not constituted under Letters Patent. The Letters Patent allow an appeal from a "final judgment," "decree" or "order" of the High Court. Mr. Justice Batchelor and Mr. Justice Heaton, interpreting the ruling of the Privy Council in the Rangoon case as laying down that an award in a land acquisition case is more in the nature of an award of an arbitrator than a "judgment, decree or order of civil Court," held that the parties have no further or other right of appeal than that expressly given by the legislature. On the matter being taken to the Privy Council, they refused to grant leave to appeal, and if the arguments at the bar and the observations of the learned Lords of the Privy Council are correctly reported in The Special Officer, Salsette Building Sites v. Dassabhai Basanji Motiwala (1918) 17 C.W.N., 421 (P.C.), it would appear that the Judicial Committee refused to regard the decision of the Bombay High Court in an appeal under Section 54 of the Land Acquisition Act as a "judgment," "decree" or "order" of a High Court within the meaning of Clause 39 of the Letters Patent. The attempt therefore of Mr. T.R. Ramachandra Ayyar to distinguish the ruling of the Privy Council in Rangoon Botatoung Company, Ld. v. The Collector, Rangoon (1918) I.L.R., 40 Calc., 21 (P.C.), on the ground that the appeal to the Privy Council was from the decision of a Judge of the Rangoon Chief Court acting as the land acquisition Judge and not of the Chief Court as an appellate tribunal hearing an appeal under Section 54, must fail. It is not suggested that the word "judgment" in Clause 15 of the Letters Patent is used in a different or wider sense than in Clause 89. As for Secretary of State for India v. Chellikani Rama Rao (1916) I.L.R., 89 Mad., 617 (P.C.) which was also referred to at the bar, I do not think that there is anything in the judgment of the Privy Council in that case which can be said to have modified the law enunciated in Rangoon Botatoung Company, Ld. v. The Collector, Rangoon (1918) I.L.R., 40 Calc., 21 (P.C.).