Held: Holding of the landlord is 13 acres of jirayat land – Only such land which a person holds (is in possession) as an owner or tenant, must be taken into account – Land leased to the tenants cannot be said to be held by the landlord either as an owner, or as a tenant – s. 6 provides that one unit of economic holding in the context of jirayat land is equivalent to a holding of 16 acres – Thus, the holding of the landlord cannot be said to be in excess of one unit of economic holding – Original authority held that the landlord’s principal source of income is from agriculture, which was upheld by the appellate authority and the revisional authority – As per s. 33(B)(5) (b), the landlord’s entitlement to terminate tenancy and recover possession of land leased is only to the extent ‘of so much thereof as would result in both the landlord and the tenant holding thereafter in the total an equal area for personal cultivation’ – Original authority and appellate authority disagreed on the extent of land to be resumed to the landlord – In deciding the extent of land to be restored, the Original authority was correct in applying the provision contained in s. 33B(5)(b) but erred in its interpretation and application – Appellate authority could not have applied s. 31B since the application of s. 31B stands excluded by s. 43A and the amended notification – Further, from the evidence on record, the landlord has 13 acres of jirayat land, which he holds as owner – Litigation having been pending for nearly
50 years – Relegating the parties to the authorities would add acrimony between the parties, as such the formula prescribed u/s.33B(5)(b) is applied to allocate the respective shares of the parties – Also, the High Court erred in remanding the case by considering, events which occurred subsequent to the date of filing of the petition – It was unnecessary for the revisional authority to remand the case – Impugned order passed by the High Court set aside – Legal heirs of original landlord entitled to 8.34 Acres in Survey No.291. [Para 24-31]
Interpretation of statutes – Interpretation of phrase ‘economic holding’ in the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1948 – Importing of the definition of ‘to hold land’ from the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966:
Held: Preamble in the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966 suggests that the object of the enactment was ‘to unify and amend the law relating to land and land revenue in the State of Maharashtra – The Act was brought in with the object of amending ‘the law relating to tenancies of agricultural lands and to make certain other provisions in regard to those lands’ – Under several provisions of the Act, reference is required to be made (D) & ORS.
to the Code – Provisions contained in the Act and the Code operate in an overlapping sphere and fertilize each other – Words used in the Code and the expressions appearing under the Act, when read harmoniously, it would indicate that the expressions in both the enactments are complementary and supplementary to each other – Thus, the Act and Code are in pari materia to each other, and the definition of ‘to hold land’ is drifted from the Code for the purpose of interpreting the phrase, ‘economic holding’ in the Act – Thus, when s. 2(6A) of the Act and s. 2(12) of the Code are read together, the economic holding of a person would be computed by taking account of the lands possessed (whether actual or not) by such person, whether as owner or tenant. [Para 22]
LIST OF CITATIONS AND OTHER REFERENCES
Devidas Narayan More v. Chunnilal Bhailal Wani AIR 1973 Bom
195 – approved.
Maruti Namdeo Gade v. Dattatraya Maval (1976) 78 Bom LR 602; Hariba Keshav Barbole v. Motibhai Deepchand AIR 1975 Bom 137; Bhavani Housing Cooperative Society v. Bangalore Development Authority, ILR 2006 KAR 1352; Gaya Prasad v. Pradeep Srivastava (2001) 2 SCC
604 : [2001] 1 SCR 923; Shakuntala Bai v. Narayan Das (2004) 5 SCC 772 : [2004] 2 Suppl. SCR 114 – referred to.
OTHER CASE DETAILS INCLUDING IMPUGNED
ORDER AND APPEARANCES
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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