Sri Thakur Radha Krishnaji vs Ramkhelawan Singh and Others

Agarwala, J.—This is an appeal by the defendant from a decision of Rowland J. It arises out of a suit for a declaration that an order of the Board of Revenue dated llth May 1940, modifying an appellate order of the Collector u/s 112B confirming an order made by the Rent Reduction Officer under? S. J12A Tenancy Act, on 3lst July 1939, was without jurisdiction. The facts are that in 189S the plaintiffs were induoted as tenants of a holding of 86 bighas odd for a period of nine years at a rental of Rs. 505. In 1905 this lease was renewed for a further period of nine years at the same rental. On the expiry of the second lease the land was held over for a short period, pending the execution of a further kabuliat which was in fact registered in 1914, the rent reserved being Rs. 520. In 1939 the plaintiffs applied for a reduction of this rent. The Rent Reduction Officer, on 31st July 1939, reduced the rent to Rs. 348-8-0 on the ground of fall of prices of agricultural produce, basing his decision on a comparison of the prices prevailing in 1939 with the prices prevailing in 1914. An appeal was preferred against this decision, and dismissed but the landlord moved the Commissioner in revision. The Commissioner declined to interfere. The Board of Revenue was then moved, and the Board set aside the Rent Reduction Officer''s order, but itself reduced the rent to Rs. 505. The -Courts below have set aside the Board''s order holding that the Board had no power to revise the order of the Rent Reduction Officer.

From the order of the Rent Reduction Officer an appeal lay to the Collector of the district under Section112B (1), Tenancy Act, which declares that the decision in the appeal shall be final. The Act itself confers no power of revision on any tribunal to which the Collector of the district is subordinate. Section 189, however, empowers the Provincial Government to make rules for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of the Act. It is noticeable that by Clause (14) of Sub-section (2) of Section 189 it is specified that the Provincial Government may prescribe the authority to whom appeals under Sub-section (1) of Section 112B shall lie and the procedure to be followed by the same authority in hearing and disposing of such appeals: The section does not authorise the framing of a rule conferring a power of revision. By Section 189A the Board of Revenue, with the previous sanction of the Provincial Government, is empowered to make rules authorising Revenue Officers to transfer any suit or other proceeding from the file of any subordinate officer to the file of any other subordinate ''officer. But this section too does not empower the Board of Revenue to make rules conferring a revisional power upon itself or upon any other authority. . In exercise of its rule-making powers u/s 189 the Provincial Government has prescribed rules. R. 2 declares that,

Except where othewise provided for by law or by these rules, all proceedings and orders of Revenue Officers, passed in the discharge of any duty imposed upon them by or under this Act, shall be subjeot to the supervision and control of the Board of Revenue: and the proceedings and orders of each Revenue Officer under this Act shall be subjeot to the supervision and control of the Bevenue Officers to whom he may be declared by the Board of Revenue to be, for the purposes of the Act, subordinate.

It was, at one stage of this litigation, eon-tended that the power of supervision and control vested in the Board of Revenue by this rule includes the power to revise the order of a subordinate Revenue Officer. The Provincial Government''s rules, however, must be consistent with the Act, and any rule inconsistent with the Act must be regarded as ultra vires the Provincial Government. The Act itself provides a remedy for a person aggrieved by an order made by a Rent Reduction Officer u/s 112A, namely, an appeal to the Collector u/s 112B, and declares that the decision in the appeal shall be final. In view of this provision the contention that a right of revision is conferred on the Board of Revenue by Rule 2 was not seriously pressed, before us. What was pressed, however, was the contention that the Board of Revenue has a general power of superintendence over Revenue Officers and is entitled, in exercise of this power, to revise all orders of officers subordinate to it. In the course of a careful and exhaustive analysis of the Regulations and Acts on which it is sought to base this power, and of the decision of the Board itself, Rowland J. arrived -at the conclusion that the Board''s power of superintendence did not include the power to revise an order of a subordinate Revenue Officer whose decision is, by statute, declared to be final. It appears that this was the view formerly taken by the Board itself in a series of cases which, however, have not been consistently followed in its later decisions. It is not necessary to deal with those decisions in this judgment as they are set out in the judgment of Rowland 3. It is sufficient to say that in my view the result of those decisions and of the observations of Rankin C. J. in Manmatha Nath Biswas Vs. Emperor, is that, where the Legislature, as in the present instance, has declared the decision of a particular officer or tribunal to be final, no other tribunal is empowered to substitute its own decision for the decision of that tribunal. Assuming, but not deciding, that the Board of Revenue has the power of superintendence over Rent Reduction Officers and the Collector of the district in appeal, that power is confined to preventing such officers from exercising a jurisdiction not conferred on them, or compelling them to exercise a jurisdiction which they have omitted to exercise. It does not include a power to compel either of those tribunals to come to a particular conclusion or to substitute for their decision, the decision of the Board of Revenue, even when the Board considers that the decision of the subordinate tribunal is wrong in law or in fact. The only difference between the Board of Revenue and the subordinate tribunals in the present case was whether the prices of produce prevailing in 1939 should be compared with the prices prevailing in 1896 when the plaintiffs were first inducted as tenants, or with the prices prevailing in 1914. While this difference may be said to raise a question of law, it certainly does not raise any question of jurisdiction. I would, therefore, hold that the case has been rightly decided by Rowland J. and ''dismiss this appeal with costs.

Fazl Ali, C.J.

I agree, but I wish to add just a few observations. Section 112B, Bihar Tenancy Act, provides that an appeal shall lie from an order made u/s 112A of any officer other than the Collector of a district exercising the powers of a Collector to the Collector of the district or to any officer specially empowered by the Provincial Government to hear such appeals, and from an order of the Collector of the district to the prescribed authority and the decision of the Collector of the district or of any officer so empowered or of the prescribed authority on such appeal shall be final. The Act does not contain any provision conferring the power of revising or interfering with the appellate order upon the Commissioner or the Board of Revenue. The absence of such a provision cannot be overlooked as the power of interference is expressly given in a number of Acts, some of which only need be referred to here by way of illustration. Section 114 (2), Estates Partition Act, provides that when an order of a Collector is modified or revised by the Commissioner, a further appeal shall lie to the Board in certain eases. Section 62, Public Demands Recovery Act, (4 of 1914) provides that the Commissioner may revise any order passed by the Collector under the Act and the Board of Revenue may revise any order passed by the Commissioner under the Act. Section 85 of the Bengal and also Bihar and Orissa Land Registration Act provides that every order passed by an officer subordinate to a Commissioner shall be subject to revision, and modification by such Commissioner and every order passed by the Commissioner shall be subject to revision and modification by the Board of Revenue. Section 91, Bengal Irrigation Act, provides that no appeal shall lie r gainst any order of the Collector under the Act except as otherwise expressly provided therein but all such proceedings and orders shall be subject to the supervision and control of the Commissioner of the division and of the Board of Revenue, who may pass such order thereon as they may respectively think fit. Section 21A, Chota Nagpur Encumbered Estates Act (6 of 1876) provides that all orders or proceedings of the Commissioner and of the Deputy Commissioner under this Act shall be subject to the supervision and control of the Board of Revenue, and the Board of Revenue may, if it thinks fit, revise, modify or reverse any such order or proceeding.

It is difficult to hold that even though Section 112B clearly states ,that the order of the Collector or the prescribed authority on appeal shallbe final and the Act contains no provision similar to those to which I have just now referred, the appellate order is open to question and may be modified or reversed by two higher revenue authorities, namely, the Commissioner and the Board of Revenue. Such a view appears to me to be quite contrary to the scheme of the Act which obviously aims at discouraging further litigation in regard to a comparatively simple matter. Rowland J. has exhaustively dealt with the contention which has been put forward in this Court also that the Commissioner and the Board of Revenue may successively interfere with the order of the Collector in a case covered by Section 112B in exercise of the general power of superintendence which they "possess under some of the old Regulations. All that I wish to say is that I was unable to find any clear provision dealing with this power of superintendence.

In the course of the argument reliance was placed on Section 29 of Regn. 2 of 1793 and Section 2 of Regn. 3 of 1822. But both these provisions have been repealed. Reliance was also placed on Section 4 of Act 1 of 1829, but this section merely provides that the Commissioners shall possess and exercise within their respective divisions the power and authority now vested in the Board of Revenue. Assuming, however, that the Board of Revenue as the highest revenue authority possesses a power of general superintendence over the proceedings of subordinate revenue authorities, the question will still arise whether this power is purely an administrative one or is wide enough to enable the Board to exercise judicial interference with the orders of the subordinate revenue Courts. Prior to the enactment of the Government of India Act of 1935 the Calcutta High Court had developed the doctrine that the term "superintendence" included the power to interfere judicially with the decisions of an inferior Court in those eases where it was found that that Court had acted without jurisdiction or had refused to exercise the jurisdiction with which it was vested or had made only a colourable pretence to exercise it. So far as the High Courts are concerned, the Government of India Act of 1935 has now made clear what is the extent of their, power of superintendence over inferior Courts. Section 224 enacts that every High Court shall have superintendence over . all Courts in India for the time being subject to its appellate jurisdiction and may do any of certain specified things, such as calling for returns, prescribing rules, forms etc. Subsection (2) of that section states that nothing in this section shall be construed as giving to a High Court any jurisdiction to question any judgment of any inferior Court which is not otherwise subject to appeal or revision. Section 224 does not apply to the Board of Revenue, but had the matter not been covered by a number of judicial pronouncements, I would have held that the power of superintendence possessed by the Board of Revenue could be used only for administrative purposes and to the limited extent indicated in Section 224 of the Act so'' far as the High Courts are concerned. In any event I am absolutely certain that it cannot extend beyond the limits suggested in the judgment of Rowland J. With these observations I agree with the judgment of my learned brother that this appeal should be dismissed with costs.