Haladdhar Mahto vs Kesar Mahto and Others

Agarwala, J.—This second appeal is by the defendant against a decision of the Subordinate Judge of Purulia reversing a decision of the Munsif. The question that arises is with regard to the status of the defendant who has been recorded in the Record of Eights as a settled raiyat. The Court below has found that the defendant is a bhagidar and that he is liable to be ejected on notice by the plaintiff, and that the entry in the Record of Rights describing the defendant as a settled raiyat is incorrect; that decision is challenged in second appeal. The Court below has referred to various circumstances which led it to conclude that the entry in the record was incorrect. Some of those circumstances are that the agreement between the parties contemplated that the landlord might be required to furnish seeds, that the landlord was entitled not only to half the produce but also to half the straw of the produce and that the defendant was not entitled to reap the crop without the landlord''s permission.

Now, all these circumstances are not inconsistent with the status of the defendant being that of a tenant; but they are also consistent with his status being that of an employee whose remuneration consisted of a part of the produce of the land. That is the view which the Court below has taken and it cannot be denied that there was evidence on which the finding could have been arrived at. The only difficulty is with respect to two decisions of the Calcutta High Court.

In those two cases, which were from Districts in Bengal, it has been held that a person cultivating land on terms similar to those in the present case was not a mere employee but a tenant. The first of these cases is Deb Nath Das v. Ram Sundar Barman A.I.R (1916). Cal. 621 The other is Secy of State v. Gobinda Prasad A.I.R (1917). Cal. 382 . In Jadab Chandra Santra Vs. Gopal Chandra Debnath, Mukerji J. sitting singly held with regard to a case in which the facts were precisely similar to the present, that the expressions ''settlement'' and ''holding the land'' are consistent with the defendant being either a tenant or an employee remunerated by part of the produce.

In Niranjan Chakravarti v. Mukunda Mohan A.I.R (1934) . Pat. 53, a case which came before me sitting singly, I held that a person holding under a Melabagh agreement is not an occupancy raiyat and cannot acquire occupancy rights. That was a case from the District of Manbhum and I relied upon observations in the District Gazetteer. The question however whether an entry in the. Record of Rights is correct is purely one of fact, and we must accept the finding of the Court below that the entry is incorrect. The mere circumstance that there were features in the case from which a different conclusion might have been drawn as to the status of the defendant does not entitle us to interfere with the finding of fact arrived at by the Court below.

There is no other point in this second appeal which must therefore be dismissed with costs.

Harries C.J.

I agree.