Original plaintiff, who had obtained permission has died.
The present petitioners are her heirs and they seek to execute the decree. Shri Bhangade, learned senior counsel, submits that it should be shown by these heirs also that they are agriculturist in their own right. According to him, simply because of succession they will not become agriculturist. The submission is fallacious and is to be rejected to be stated. When an agricultural land devolves upon heirs, every heir gets share in it. As soon as share devolves upon him, he becomes an agriculturist whether or not he holds other agricultural land. If such a course is not to be followed, then no heir would be able to succeed to the self-acquired agricultural land of his father upon his dying intestate. All such lands in such case would always revert to the government. It must be said that a person upon whom such agricultural land devolves automatically becomes an agriculturist whether or not he cultivates the land personally thereafter. He can always cultivate a land through agricultural labourer.
Bombay High Court
Amarjyot Singh Jaswant Singh vs State Of Maharashtra on 18 July, 2009
Bench: C. L. Pangarkar
Citation: 2009(5) ALLMR 791 Bom, 2009(6) MHLJ 115
1. This writ petition challenges the order passed by Tahsildar, Amravati, whereby he held the petitioners to be non-agriculturists.
2. The facts necessary for decision of the writ petition are as follows -
The petitioners are the heirs of one Late Hardeep Kaur Jaggi - a plaintiff in Civil Suit No.107 of 1984, while the respondents are the heirs of one Prabha Sabnis - the original defendant in the said suit. Plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur instituted civil suit for specific performance of contract of sale of 11 acres of land out of field S.No.
116 against Prabha Sabnis. The said suit was contested by defendant Prabha on various grounds. One of the grounds raised was that decree for specific performance in favour of plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur could not be passed as she was not agriculturist. The trial court as well as the first appellate court rejected the contention on two counts. First, there was no impediment in passing the decree since permission to purchase the land can be obtained even after a decree is passed. The second ground was that plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur had placed on record the 7/12 extracts showing the ownership of the land as well as a permission obtained from sub-divisional Officer for purchasing another land and therefore, there was evidence available to hold that she was an agriculturist. Therefore, a decree was passed by trial court on 18/3/1993 and was confirmed by district court on 30/7/2002. The second appeal preferred by defendant Prabha was dismissed in limine. The decree was put to execution in 1994 itself but was kept stayed until now as the appeals, review etc. at the instance of the defendants were pending. In the meanwhile, respondent/defendants moved an application before Tahsildar for a declaration that the present petitioners i.e. heirs of Smt. Hardeep Kaur are not agriculturist and it be so declared. The Tahsildar found that the present petitioners were either businessmen or house wives and not agriculturist. This order is challenged in this writ petition.
3. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioners as well as the respondents.
4. There cannot be any doubt that by virtue of provisions of Section 100 of the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands (Vidarbha Region) Act, 1958 the jurisdiction to decide the question whether a person is an agriculturist can be decided by the Tahsildar alone. Shri Bhangade, learned senior Counsel for the respondents, submits that the said question has been so decided by the Tahsildar and such decision cannot be said to be one without jurisdiction. The disputecannot be resolved by such simple proposition. One has to bear in mind that the defendants had raised a contention before the civil court that no decree could be passed on the ground that Smt.Hardeep Kaur was not an agriculturist. Smt.Hardeep Kaur in order to prima facie establish that she is an agriculturist and holds agricultural land, had placed 7/12 extracts of revenue recorded as well as the permission granted by the Sub-divisional Officer to purchase another land. They were so considered by the courts below. Particularly, trial court had framed an issue as to whether plaintiff is prevented from purchasing the suit field in view of provisions of Section 89 of the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act. This issue was answered in the negative by the trial court. Similarly, the district court had considered the evidence in that regard and made following observations.
33. Then, a submission was also made that plaintiff is not an agriculturist and in view of the provisions of Section 89 of B.T. and A.L.Act she is not entitled to the relief. Even if we accept for the sake of argument that, the plaintiff is not an agriculturist, even then, the conditional decree could be passed.
Besides, this, in the present case the evidence has been laid by the plaintiff to show that at the time of passing the decree she was holding the agriculture land which is evident from the 7/12 extract Exh.80. The plaintiff obtained the permission from S.D.O. on 11/4/1986, which is produced at Exh.81 and then purchased the land of which 7/12 extract is at Exh.80. So, it cannot be said that section 89 of the B.T. And A.L. Act would come in the way of the plaintiff.
5. It is, therefore, obvious that the plaintiff had not only placed on record the revenue record showing ownership of agricultural land but had even produced the copy of the permission granted by the S.D.O. to purchase another land. It is in this context and the evidence that the civil court clearly found that there was evidence available of plaintiff being agriculturist. It must be assumed that due to availability of such evidence that the parties did not ask the civil court to frame an issue and to refer it and the issue was not referred to civil court. Civil court in fact is not obliged to frame and to refer such issue to tahsildar simply because such averement is made. In the instant case, since there was enough of the evidence already available on record, the civil court did not rightly refer the issue to the tahsildar to obtain a finding whether Smt.Hardeep Kaur was an agriculturist. To my mind, once the finding is recorded by the civil court, same matter could not have been agitated before the tahsildar. This court in a decision reported in AIR 1982 Bom.491 (M/s Nilesh Construction Company and anr. ..vs.. Mrs. Gangubai and others) has made the following observations.
"If the question raised is whether the provisions of the Tenancy Act are attracted to a given case, on facts which are not in dispute, it is clearly permissible for the civil Court to go into the question of the applicability of the provisions of the Tenancy Act. If it is found on the facts that the reference to the Revenue Court should not have at all been made as the lands were excluded from the operation of the Tenancy Act, it would be permissible to recall the reference."
The ratio of the decision is that the civil court can find out whether the provisions of the Tenancy Act are attracted in a given case or not and even it is permissible for the civil court in certain cases to recall the reference about tenancy. Apparently, therefore, the civil court does have right to look into the material already on record and then decide whether matter needs to be referred to the tenancy court or not and whether it is necessary to obtain such finding from the tenancy court or not. In this matter, both the courts have concurrently found that evidence to hold that the plaintiff was an agriculturist was available on record.
6. Now, that the defendants find that they are going to loose the property, they have resorted to a novel way to make an application to tahsildar and obtain a negative declaration. A Declaration would be required to be sought by a person who intends to purchase the property and not by a person who intends to sell.
That is so because the sale in favour of purchaser would be void and that would not affect the seller at all.
7. Further the provisions of Section 125 of the B.T. And A.L.
Act (Vidarbha Region) make the things very clear. Section reads as follows -
125. Suits involving issues required to be decided under this Act.
(1) If any suit instituted in any Civil Court, involves any issues which are required to be settled, decided or deal with by any authority competent to settle, decide or deal with such issues under this Act (hereinafter referred to as the "competent authority") the Civil Court shall stay the suit and refer such issues to such competent authority for determination.
(2) On receipt of such reference from the Civil Court, the competent authority shall deal with and decide such issues in accordance with provisions of this Act and shall communicate its decision to the Civil court and such Court shall thereupon dispose of the suit in accordance with the procedure applicable thereto.
Explanation.- For the Purpose of this section a Civil Court shall include a Mamlatdar's Court constituted under the Mamlatdar's Court Act, 1906.
8. What this Section contemplates is that the issue required to be decided by competent authority, if arises in a suit, it is to be referred to civil court. So, what is, therefore, necessary is that such issue must in fact arise and then alone it can be referred and to my mind tahsildar cannot answer such issue unless such an issue arises in the civil suit and it is referred to him.
9. Further there are other ground why the order of the tahsildar cannot be sustained. The respondent in the application before tahsildar makes a following averements.(As translated) "During the pendency of said Darkhast case filed as per the said judgment and decree, the sub-Divisional Officer, Amravati by order passed in Revenue Case No.59(23)/Narayanpur-6/1985-86 on 11/4/1986 granted permission under Section 89 of Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1958 to plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur Jaswantsingh Jaggi.
In the application for obtaining said permission, plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur stated that she has agricultural land bearing Survey No.1/A, area 2 hectares 23 R., revenue assessment Rs.5.50 at mauza Narayanpur, Tq. Distt.Amravati and that she is personally cultivating the said land and further stated that she being landless wants to purchase the said agricultural land.
The applicant has contended that plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur sought permission for purchasing specific agricultural land from the sub-Divisional Officer, Amravati but did not seek permission for purchasing suit land, the description of which is as below:
Agricultural land bearing Survey No.116, area 11 acre 9 gunthe situated at Mauze Rahatgaon, Pargana - Nandgaon Peth, Tq. Distt.Amravati. It has been clearly mentioned in para-4 of the decree drawn as per the order of civil court. Before execution of sale-deed and getting possession, if was obligatory on the part of plaintiff Sau.Hardeep Kaur to obtain permission for purchasing suit land and conversion of its use from non-agricultural to agricultural (in case of agriculturists and agricultural labour) and the plaintiff failed to obtain such permission.
If these averements are seen, it is clear that deceased-plaintiff was granted permission to purchase field Survey No.1/A of Narayanpur.
This permission was granted on 11/4/1986 and the plaintiff had even purchased the land. The 7/12 extracts shows that her name is even recorded in the revenue record. As soon as the plaintiff got permission from S.D.O. and she purchased the land survey No.1/A, she became an agriculturist. Therefore, she became an agriculturist way back in 1986. No such further permission would be required if she intended to purchase more land. Respondent in the above pleadings had only made a grievance that a separate permission was not taken. Such a grievance was absolutely uncalled for and improper. No separate permission would be required for any number of subsequent purchases of agricultural land once such a permission is granted by the S.D.O. and one piece of agricultural land is purchased. In the teeth of the admitted position that the permission was obtained by the plaintiff while purchasing other land, the tahsildr should not have and could not have held that the plaintiff was not an agriculturist.
10. Original plaintiff, who had obtained permission has died.
The present petitioners are her heirs and they seek to execute the decree. Shri Bhangade, learned senior counsel, submits that it should be shown by these heirs also that they are agriculturist in their own right. According to him, simply because of succession they will not become agriculturist. The submission is fallacious and is to be rejected to be stated. When an agricultural land devolves upon heirs, every heir gets share in it. As soon as share devolves upon him, he becomes an agriculturist whether or not he holds other agricultural land. If such a course is not to be followed, then no heir would be able to succeed to the self-acquired agricultural land of his father upon his dying intestate. All such lands in such case would always revert to the government. It must be said that a person upon whom such agricultural land devolves automatically becomes an agriculturist whether or not he cultivates the land personally thereafter. He can always cultivate a land through agricultural labourer.
11. Mr.Bhangade, senior counsel, further contends that agriculturist is that person who cultivates the land personally and all heirs are either businessmen or house wives and they are rightly heldto be not agriculturist. The submission cannot be accepted for the above stated reason. For all these reasons, the order passed by the tahsildar needs to be set aside. The petition is allowed. The order passed by the tahsildar is set aside. The respondent shall pay costs of this petition to the petitioners and bear their own.
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