Maumohan Lal Bhagat vs Bishun Lal Singh

Scroope, J.—The plaintiff as a jagirdar of 8 annas share of village Santa in the Chatra Subdivision of Hazari-bagh District sued the defendant as mukarraridar of that interest for arrears of rent, cesses and digwari.

The defendant admitted tho rent as claimed but pleaded liability for only one half of the cess and digwari claimed and this, he alleged, was payable direct to the zamindar. But the suit was decreed in full by the Sub-Divisional Officer, Munsiff of Chatra, and this decision was affirmed in appeal by the Judicial Commissioner of Chota Nagpur.

Plaintiff and defendant are admittedly jagirdars of eight annas interest in each of the village but the defendant is a mukarraridar in the plaintiff''s share of 8 annas and it is in respect of this interest that the suit is brought.

Plaintiff based his claim on a decision u/s 87, Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act, according to which the claim will be correct. But the defendant relies on an inter partes decree in a rent suit based on a compromise subsequent to the decision in Section 87 case, by which it was agreed that defendant was liable to pay half the cess and digwari to the zamindar and plaintiff was liable for the other half. Both the Courts held that having regard to the terms of Section 258, Chofca Nagpur Tenancy Act, the parties could not go back on the decision in the Section 87 case and that it was final as determining the rent, cess and digwari payable by the defendant.

This view is tantamount to saying that once there is a decision u/s 87, the parties have no power to vary it by an agreement arrived at subsequent to such a suit; in other words, that it operates for all time and cannot be varied at the will of the parties. That is obviously an impossible position. There is nothing in Section 258 to warrant that view; that section so far as it applies to this case only gives finality to a decree in such a suit and places it on the same footing as a decree of a civil Court.

Accordingly we have a decree here determining the rent, cAsses and digwari payable by the plaintiff but it has been proved that the parties subsequently varied the terms of the decree by a compromise. It is noT urged that the compromise was arrived at fraudulently or that there was anything illegal in it per se. It accordingly must prevail and the appeal must be allowed and the suit must be dismissed with costs so far as the claita for cesses and digwari is concerned.