Mohammad Taqi Khan vs Dori and Others

Kanhaya Lal, J.—In this case certain issues were remitted by this Court on the 21st of June 1923. The effect of the findings on those issues is that the plaintiff is entitled to a decree for possession of the disputed land and for the removal of the construction made thereon by the defendants. The people of the village have evidently been using the land as a threshing floor for some time past. It was recorded as kharmangat or threshing floor in the khasra prepared at the last Settlement. They had, however, no right to construct an enclosure thereon and thereby to appropriate the whole land to their exclusive use. As held in Chatterpal v. Gajadhar Upadhya 25 Ind. Cas. 59, a tenant cannot enclose and construct a house upon a plot of open land in the abadi without the consent of the landlord, though he may have been using it for temporary purposes for a long time.

The appeal is, therefore, allowed and the claim of the plaintiff decreed for possession of the disputed land and for the removal of the structures built thereon by the defendants with costs here and hitherto. The defendants will be entitled to remove the materials of the construction which they have made. The right of the defendants to use the land as a threshing floor in common with the other tenants of the village will remain unaffected. The defendants will bear their own costs throughout.