Vummethala Rama Rao vs Mukta Appayya and Others

The question in these second appeals is whether the plaintiff is entitled to any and what trees on the suit holding. It is now conceded that the

lands are situate in an estate under the amended definition introduced in 1936. The rights of parties are governed by Section 12, Estates Land Act.

Section 12 Clause (1) as it now stands is as follows :

Subject to any rights which by custom or by contract in writing executed by the ryot before the passing of this Act are reserved to the landholder,

every ryot shall have the tight to use, enjoy, cut down, carry away or otherwise dispose of all trees now in his holding and in the case of trees

which after the passing of this Act may be planted by the ryot or which may naturally grow upon the holding, he shall have the light to use, enjoy,

cut down, carry away or otherwise dispose of them notwithstanding any contract or custom to the contrary.

In the present case the finding is that all these trees have grown on the holding after 1st July 1908. The finding also is as regards the custom set up,

that no such custom is established in favour of the landholder.

The learned advocate for the appellant contended that the relevant date to be taken into consideration in regard to the present holding is not the

date of the commencement of the Act in 1908 but really the date when the Amending Act of 1936 came into force. In this view he argued that

various leases which came into existence between 1908 and 1936 should also have been considered by the Court in the matter of establishing the

custom relied on and the finding therefore arrived at ignoring these documents is not one which should be accepted. Section 12 which I have

already set out refers to the trees now in his holding and also trees which after the passing of the Act, may be planted by the ryot. The question for

consideration is whether the words ""now"" and ""after the passing of the Act"" should be understood to be 1st July 1908. Prima facie that must be the

meaning of these expressions. There is nothing in the section to indicate that the passing of this Act, which means the Madras Estates Land Act I

[1] of 1908 could be read as the passing of the Amending Act of 1936 or that the word now must be read as the commencement of such Act.

Wherever the Legislature wanted to make the point clear the other way about they used the appropriate language--See for instance, Expln. 2

added to Section 6, Expln. 5 to Section 6 (a); Section 23 expressly refers to the commencement of the Madras Estates Land Third Amendment

Act, 1936, as contrasted with this Act amending the Madras Act I [1] of 1908; so also Section 28 proviso. I am not able to agree therefore with

the contention of the appellant on this point.

It was also argued that it is impossible to speak of ""ryot"" before there was an estate and therefore the use of the word ""ryot"" in Section 12 and

holding"" would indicate that the Legislature was contemplating the rights of the ryot only to trees after 1936. A similar argument which was

advanced was rejected by a Bench of this Court in Venkoba Rao Vs. Krishnaswami Naicker and Another, . I therefore reject this contention also.

These second appeals fail and are dismissed with costs. No leave.