Kondapa Rajam Naidu and Others vs Devarakonda Suryanarayana and Another

The plaintiffs were in enjoyment of a watercourse. For the purpose of this case, we may assume that they had not acquired an easement by

prescription, for the enjoyment did not extend to 20 years. The defendants, who have no manner of right to the watercourse or the land over which

it flowed, obstructed the plaintiff''s user. The District Judge has given the injunction asked for. It is argued by the learned Advocate-General that

the plaintiffs not having acquired a complete title, they would not be entitled to restrain the defendants from interference. The law is well settled that

if the plaintiff was in possession of land for less than the statutory period, he would be entitled to protect that possession against any one but the

true owner. We do not think That there is any distinction in principle because the right now claimed to be protected is in the nature of an

incorporeal right in process of acquisition. Incorporeal rights are in many cases capable of possession just as much as rights to corporeal

hereditaments. In Jaffies v. Williams 5 Ex., 792 it was held by Baron Parke that a trespasser on adjoining land was not entitled to cause a

subsidence by working mines to the prejudice of the mines in the plaintiffs'' enjoyment, though he had not acquired a title to the same. This was

followed in Elisabeth Bibby v. Garter 4 Hurlstone and Norman''s Report, 153, where the plaintiff who had not acquired a title was held entitled to

sue for damages against a trespasser on adjoining land who caused injury to the plaintiff''s buildings. The principle of these cases has been applied

in India to cases of light where, before the right had matured, a trespasser interfered with it. [See Jootoor Acchanna Vs. Vanamala Venkamma,

and Dhuman Khan v. Muhammad Khan ILR (1897) All. 153.] We think that the District Judge is right in applying the same principle to the present

case of a watercourse enjoyed for less than the prescriptive period. We must dismiss the second appeal with costs.