Basunta Coomar Roy Chowdhri vs Baksu Mollah and Others

The question, involved in this appeal, is whether, having regard to the provisions of secs. 178 and 179 of the Bengal Tenancy Act, a contract by a tenant holding under a permanent mokurari lease to pay interest on the arrears of rent at a higher rate than 12 per cent, per annum, is recoverable in law. The Plaintiff brought this suit to re-recover from the Defendant a sum of lis. 244 for arrears of rent and interest, the interest calculated being at the rate of one anna per rupee per month according to the terms of a registered kabuliyat executed by the Defendants in favour of the Plaintiff. This document is printed at page 6 of the Paper-book. It purports to create a permanent mokurari lease, and was admittedly executed after the passing of the Bengal Tenancy Act.

The Munsif made a decree in favour of the Plaintiff in terms of his prayer. On appeal, the Subordinate Judge has varied the amount of interest awarded by the Munsif, and directed that the Plaintiff should recover interest at the rate of 12 per cent. only. He was of opinion that sec. 179 of the Bengal Tenancy Act does not override the provisions of cl (h), sec. 178, relating to the payment of interest on arrears of rent.

The Plaintiff has appealed to this Court, and the contention on his behalf is that under sec;,.179 the Plaintiff is entitled to recover the interest agreed upon between the parties by their contract, and that the provisions of cl (h), sec. 178, do not affect the express terms of sec. 179. The sole question in this case is what is the meaning to be attached to the provisions of sec. 179, and whether, in the case of tenants holding permanent tenures, a contract to pay interest not in accordance with the provisions sec. 67 of the Bengal Tenancy Act can be regarded as valid in law. No authority has been cited on either side, and we must, therefore, deal with the point on general principles. Subsec. 3, cl (h), sec. 178 provides as follows:--"Nothing in any contract made between a landlord and a tenant after the passing of this Act shall affect the provisions of sec. 67 relating to interest payable on arrears of rent." Sec. 67 provides that, " an arrear of rent shall bear simple interest at the rate of twelve per cent, per annum from the expiration of that quarter of the agricultural year in which the instalment falls due to the institution of the suit." It will be observed, that the expression "tenant" in sub-sec. 3, el (A), is of a general character. Sec. 5 which defines the word " tenant" is as follows:-''Tenant'' means a person who holds land under another person, and. is, or but for a special, contract would be, liable to pay rent for that land to that person; sub-sec. 3, el (h), sec. 178 therefore includes tenants holding under mokurari leases. Sec. 179 provides "that nothing in this Act shall be deemed to prevent a proprietor or a holder of a permanent tenure in a permanently-settled area from granting a permanent mokurari lease on any terms agreed on between him and his tenant." It is obvious that, if the argument put forward by the Appellant be well founded,'' we must hold that the Legislature intended by see. 179 to repeal what it had expressly enacted by el. (A), sub-see. 3, see. 178. It may be observed that, if that had been the intention of the Legislature, nothing would have been easier than to include a saving clause to that effect in the clause referred to. Now it is a well-recognized principle in the interpretation of statutes that an Act of the Legislature should be so construed as to give effect, so'' far as possible, to all its enactments; nor must it be so construed as to allow one provision to stultify the other. The question which we have to determine is whether there is anything in sec. 179 by which the Legislature intended to override the provisions of cl. (A), sub-sec. 3, sec. 178. In order to answer the question it is necessary to bear in mind that, ordinarily speaking, the word "terms" vised in connection with a lease does not include a condition relating to interest upon arrears of rent. In Eedmond on Landlord and Tenant, p. 52, will be found a passage showing exactly the matter included in "the terms of a lease." Did the Legislature use the expression "terms" in sec. 179 of the Tenancy Act in its ordinary legal acceptation or did it intend to give the word a wider meaning Having regard to the provisions contained in sec. 67, and cl. (h), sub-sec. 3, sec. 178, we are not prepared to say that it had the latter object in view. If that had been the intention, it would have avoided the expression "terms" which conveys a distinctive signification in the treatises on the law relating to landlords and tenants and employed instead the more comprehensive word "conditions," Then again it is to be observed that (apart from special logislation)- it was considered at one time doubtful -whether the holders of permanent tenures generally had the power to create permanent under-tenures. Under sec. 3 of the Bengal Regulation of 1812 the proprietors alone were so authorized. And it is by no means improbable that the Legislature intended by sec. 179 to vest the holder of permanent tenures generally with the right of granting permanent mokurari leases on any terms agreed upon between the parties which did not contravene the foregoing provisions of the law. However that may be, it seems to us that we ought not to put such a construction on sec. 179, as would have the effect of nullifying the provisions of the previous section with respect to an important body of tenants. For these reasons, as at present advised, we think that the conclusion, arrived at by the Subordinate Judge in this case, is correct, and that this appeal must be dismissed with costs.