P. Govindarajulu Naidu vs The State of Madras

Panchapakesn Ayyar, J.—This is an appeal by Govindarajalu Naidu, the plaintiff in O.S. No. 22 of 1954, on the file of the Subordinate

Judge, Chingleput, against the decree and judgment dismissing his suit with costs. He has filed the suit against the State of Madras for a declaration

that the notification of Mothirambedu village in Chingleput District as a zamindari estate under the Madras Estates (Abolition and Conversion into

Ryotwari) Act, XXVI of 1948 was illegal and void and for possession. The State of Madras had hotly contested the suit and urged that it was

certainly an estate under the Estates Land Act, and was registered in the name of Anandapadmanabam as a zamin estate, and was a part of

Thirumishy zamindari, and would be therefore, an estate under the Estates Land Act, and had been correctly notified and taken over by the

Government on 3rd January 1951. The learned Subordinate Judge discussed the evidence and came to the conclusion that, despite the decision by

a Bench of this Court in C.M.A. No. 437 of 1926 that this village of Mothirambedu was not proved to be a zamindari village, it had been proved

to be a zamindari village under the Estates Land Act, because of the additional evidence let in by the State in the present suit, which evidence was

not available to the learned Judges when they decided the civil miscellaneous appeal. So, he dismissed the suit with costs of the State amounting to

Rs. 500-12-0 and directed the plaintiff to bear his own costs of Rs. 1275-2-0. We have perused the records and heard the learned Counsel on

both sides. Mr. Vedantachariar for the appellant and the learned Government Pleader for the State argued the case fully and fairly. Mr.

Vedantachariar urged that there was no reason whatever for disturbing the finding of a Bench of this Court in C.M.A. No. 437 of 1926 (Ex. A. 1),

that the suit village was not proved to be a zamindari village, and that the so-called additional evidence let in this suit by the State of Madras was

totally inadequate for proving that the village was a zamindari village. The learned Government Pleader joined issue on this. According to him, the

additional evidence let in conclusively proves that the suit village of Mothirambedu was one of the villages of Thirumishy zamindari mentioned in Ex.

B-1, the kabuliat entered into by the Governor in Council of Fort St. George with Venkiah, the proprietor of Zamindari of Thirumishy in 1802, and

that this would be clear also from the report of the Greenway that Mothirambedu was a zamindari village, and from Exs. B-2 and B-3 showing

Mothirambedu village to be a zamindari village paying a peishkash of Rs. 52-2-3 per year. Mr. Vedantachari pointed out that Ex. B-1 did not

mention the Mothirambedu village at all as part of Thirumishy zamindari, that the Government had failed to produce a list of the villages included in

Thirumishy zamindari and comprised in Ex. B-1, that Ex. B-1 merely stated that the eight shrotriem villages were included in Thirumishy zamindari

but did not state what these villages were, much less name Mothirambedu as one of the eight villages. He pointed out further that, under Ex. A-7,

dated 10th December, 1796, this village of Mohirambedu, which was then lying waste and desolate and uncultivated, was granted in mirasi right to

a nattuvar (headman) called Rangaswami Mudali, and that it was improbable that this village, given to Rangaswami, was six years afterwards

granted to Venkiah, a man of another caste, and that Exs. B-2 and B-3 showed a third person, Anandapadmanabhan, as the proprietor of the

village while calling it zamindari. He urged further that Ex. B-2 was merely a list of waste and unproductive lands and that in Ex. B-3

Anandapadmanabhan was shown as a proprietor of the village of Mothirambedu without showing that village to be then, or before, a part of

Thirumishy zamindari and, without showing how Anandapadmanabhan, a man of a different caste from Venkiah and Rangaswami Mudali, got this

village. The learned Government Pleader was hard put to it to explain these discrepancies. He wanted to urge that perhaps Rangaswami Mudali, a

nattuvar who got the village in mirasi right in 1796, somehow lost it or alienated it and it came to Venkiah, the zamindar of Thirumishy zamindari, in

1802 and that Venkiah must have somehow lost it, or alienated it, and another person, Anandapadmanabhan, must have got it by the time of Ex.

B-3. In our opinion, it will be extremely unsafe to base legal rights, or work out legal rights, on such speculation without any proof. Speculation is

even worse than surmise, and surmise, it is well known, is not admissible under the law of evidence, being quite different from inference, which is a

logical deduction from proved facts.

Then the learned Government Pleader urged that the owner of Mothirambedu village had got it registered in the Collector''s register in Ex. B-3

as a zamindari village, and was paying peshkush for it, and so will be in a way estopped from contending that it is not a zamindari village. Mr.

Vedantachari rightly pointed out that in olden days before the abolition of the zamindaris, many a petty landholder wanted to pass off as a

zamindar, and got a kind of unearned dignity thereby but that such a pretence, even for years, would not destroy the real character of the property.

He relied on the ruling of Venkatarama Ayyar, J. as he then was, in Kalahatheeswaraswami Temple v. State of Madras (1954) 1 M.L.J. 258=66

L.W. 1004, to that effect, and on the confirmation of the above ruling by a Bench of the Andhra High Court consisting of Subba Rao C.J. and

Bhimasankaram, J. in State of Madras v. Kalahatheeswaraswami Temple (1955) 1 A.W.R. 603. These rulings are conclusive answers to this

contention. It is obvious that 50 years of calling himself a Raja will not make a beggar a Raja, and 50 years of calling a concubine a wife will not

make her a wife when she is only really a concubine.

Of course, there are some small circumstances proved in the evidence let in by the State of Madras which cast a little doubt whether

Mothirambedu was at any time part of any zamindari. But we are not concerned with such doubts. The definite case of the Government was that

Mothirambedu was a zamindari village comprised in the Thirumishy zamindari and included in the kabuliat, Ex. B-l. That case the State of Madras

was bound to prove, and it utterly failed to prove it. Mr. Vedantachari stated that the village of Mothirambedu was only a whole inam village and

we think that it is so. The proof that it is a whole inam village is there, but not the proof that it is a zamindari village. The mere fact that the inam title

deed for the whole village of Mothirambedu was not produced by the plaintiff would not disprove this contention that it is only a whole inam village

and not a zamindari village, in the face of the overwhelming evidence in favour of it, and the failure of the State to prove that it is a zamindari village.

No doubt, the further contention of the plaintiff that it was an under tenure village is not sustainable on the evidence and must be rejected. In such

matters, the plaintiffs invariably raise some tenable and some untenable pleas. The mere fact that a minor inam measuring some 2 acres is included

in Mothirambedu village and was proved to exist and was covered by a title deed is irrelevant for the purpose of proving that Mothirambedu

village was a zamindari village. Such a minor inam might have existed in a whole inam village also.

The learned Government Pleader relied on the Supreme Court ruling in The State of Madras and Another Vs. V. Srinivasa Ayyangar, . But that

ruling will have no application to the facts of this case, where this village was not proved to have been at any time included in the Thirumishy or any

other zamindari. So it cannot be held to be an estate on the facts of this case. In the end, therefore, we set aside the dismissal of the suit by the

lower Court, and grant the plaintiff a declaration that the notification of Mothirambedu village as a zamindari estate, under the Madras Estates

(Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act, XXVI of 1948, was illegal and void, but that the suit village is a whole inam village, and we leave

open the question whether a notification of the village under Act XXX of 1947 will be valid or not. In the circumstances, we direct all the parties to

bear their own costs throughout.