Case: Jibon Chandra Sarma Doloi Vs. Anandi Ram Kalita &amp; Others

1. These two appeals arise from a suit instituted by the appellant in the Court of the Special Subordinate Judge, Assam Valley Districts, in which he claimed a declaration that the sale deeds of lands described in detail in the various Schedules attached to the plaint were void and for possession of the lands covered by the said sale deeds. His case was that Madhab Temple at Hajo is a very ancient temple and the Assam Rajahs had grants lands to the Bardeuries (temple officials) to enable them to render service to the deities installed in the said temple. The lands thus granted to the temple officials were endowed lands and the same had been burdened with service to the temple; in other words, the grantees were entitled to enjoy the lands on condition that they rendered the requisite service to the temple. As a corollary of the burden imposed on the grantees by the said grant the lands were inalienable to strangers though they could be transferred to any of the Bardeuries of the temple. According to the appellant the said lands had originally been granted to Hem Kanta Sarma and Uma Kanta Sarma who were then the worshippers at the temple. The respondents who were impleaded to the suit represented the heirs of the original grantees and assignees from those heirs. The appellant has brought this suit on behalf of the Madhab Temple at Hajo, and his case is that the alienations made by the worshippers in favour of non-worshippers were invalid and so the temple was entitled to claim a declaration as set out in the plaint and to ask for possession of the lands unauthorisedly transferred to the predecesors in title of the respondents. The lands in suit have been described in detail and specified in three Schedules called Ka, Kha and Ga.2. The respondents denied this claim. They urged that the original grants were not burdened with service and were alienable without any restriction whatever. They also pleaded that they had purchased the lands bona fide for valuable consideration and without notice of any such burden or obligation subsisting on the lands. Besides, they added a plea of limitation in respect of the lands specified in Schedules Kha and Ga.3. The trial court upheld the appellants contention and made a finding that the lands in suit were burdened with service with the result that the impugned alienations were void. It also found that the purchasers had not shown that they had made adequate enquiries and so their plea that they were purchasers without notice could not be sustained. On the question of limitation, however, it accepted the plea raised by the respondents in respect of the lands described in Schedules Kha and Ga. In regard to the lands described in Schedule Ka the trial Court directed that the appellant should obtain delivery of possession of the said lands through the transferor-defendants or their heir if the latter were willing to render service to the temple; otherwise the appellant was held entitled to get independent possession and the said transferors would be deemed to have relinquished their interest in the said lands.4. This decree gave rise to cross appeals before the District Court. The said appeals were heard together and the appellate court confirmed the decree passed by the trial court in respect of Kha and Ga lands. In regard to the lands in Schedule Ka the appellate court maintained the declaration in favour of the appellant but discharged the conditional decree for possession because it held that in regard to the said lands the appellant must be left to move the sovereign authority to sue for resumption of the said lands.5. This appellate decree became the subject matter of two appeals and cross objections before the High Court. The High Court has held that the finding concurrently recorded by the courts below in regard to the burden subsisting on the lands in question was based on evidence most of which was hearsay and the whole of which taken together was meagre and insufficient in law to sustain the said finding. The High Court has also criticised the courts below for placing the onus of proof in regard to the character of the lands on the respondents. According to the High Court it was for the appellant to prove his case in respect of the nature of the original grant. The High Court has then taken into account the fact that the evidence shows that many of the lands were transferred to strangers and that was inconsistent with the case made out by the appellant. Besides, the High Court has referred to the fact that the lands in question are described as Brahmottar lands in revenue papers and that clearly shows that the said lands are heritable and transferable without restriction. On the question of limitation the High Court has accepted the plea of the respondents that Art. 144 of the Limitation Act applied. As to the declaration granted to the appellant by the District Court the High Court has observed that the said declaration was absolutely futile. In the result the suit preferred by the appellant has been dismissed with costs throughout. It is this decision which is challenged before us by the appellant with a certificate granted to the appellant by the High Court in that behalf.

Court's reasoning:
7. It appears that prior to the conquest of Assam under the previous regime the predecessors in interest of the then owners of Nisf-khiraj estates held their lands revenue-free and called themselves lakhirajdars.It appears that the instructions issued by the Government were not fully carried out by General Jenkins. Instead of treating all lakhiraj lands as being on the same footing and liable to assessment the General drew a broad distinction between debotter lands which were appropriated to temples and lands known as brahmottar or dharmottar, that is to say lands devoted to some religious purpose not being temple lands.This summary of the history of these lands which is to be found in the introduction to the Assam Land Revenue Manual shows that Nisf-khirajdar of the present day "is ordinarily a person whose lands were claimed by his ancestors revenue-free on the ground that they were granted by the Assam Rajas for some religious or charitable purpose". It appears that the word Nisf-khiraj was invented for the first time in 1871 and it applied to all estates which paid half the ordinary revenue rates. This word was presumably invented to avoid confusion caused by the use of the word lakhiraj which had been applied to them prior to 1871.It is unnecessary to refer to the said exceptions. It would thus be clear, and indeed it is not disputed, that the transferor Bardeuries who held the lands in suit fall under S. 8(1)(a) and became land holders under S. 3(g). The inevitable consequence of this position is that S. 9 applies to them and their rights in the lands in their occupation are statutorily recognised to be permanent, hereitable and transferable. This statutory position is consistent with the declaration made by the Government of India in 1879, and in view of this clear statutory position it would be difficult to sustain the plea that the lands in question are burdened with the special condition that they can be transferred only to Bardeuries and not to any strangers outside the group. As the High Court has found, and that is no longer is dispute, these lands are described as brahmottar lands in revenue records and to the said lands and their holders the statutory provisions of the Regulation to which we have just referred applied; therefore, it is impossible to escape the conclusion that by virtue of the relevant statutory provisions of the Regulation the lands must be deemed to be heritable and transferable without any restriction. This aspect of the matter was completely ignored by the trial court and the appellate court and so the High Court was right in correcting the error which had crept into the concurrent decisions of the courts below.14. Besides, the High court was also right in holding that in a case of this kind where the appellant urged that the lands could be alienated only to a specified class of persons, the onus was on the appellant and not on the respondents to prove the contrary. Failure to put the onus on the appellant introduced a serious infirmity in the approach adopted by the courts below in dealing with this question. That was another infirmity in their decision. It is also clear that the evidence adduced by the appellant in support of his case to which reference has been made by the first two courts is entirely unsatisfactory, and, even if it is believed, in law it would be insufficient to sustain the plea that there was a limitation on the transferability of the lands in question. We are also satisfied that the declaration granted by the District Court was futile. Therefore, in our opinion, the view taken by the High Court is absolutely correct and the grievance made by the appellant against the validity of the said conclusion cannot be sustained.