This appeal arises from the decree in O.S No. 15 of 1954, on the file of the Subordinate Judge's Court, Ramanathapuram, declaring that the suit village of Neriyandooval in Mudukulathur taluk, Ramanathapuram Dt., was one to which the provisions of Madras Act XXX of 1947 and the notifications thereunder would not apply and that the appellant could not interfere with the respondents' possession of the same. The State of Madras, which was the first defendant to the action, is the appellant to the appeal. Neriyandoval was on the 92-3/4 villages in Perungaranai Vattam which was a Dharmasanam grant by the anceint Pandyan King Sundarapandian to certain Brhamins. It is conceded that it is not an inam estate under the provisions of the Madras Act XXVI of 1948. The appellant issued a notification under the provisions of Madras Act XXX of 1947, for reducing the rent. Thereupon the 9th respondent filed an application for the issue of a writ of certiorari under Art. 226 of the Constitution in C.M.P No. 13299 of 1950 to this Court for quashing the proceedings initiated by the appellant. Having regard to the nature of the question involved and the evidence that was necessary to be gone into, it was apparently considered necessary that the appropriate remedy for the petitioner was to file a suit. On behalf of the State, the learned Advocate General waived notice under S. 80, C.P.C in case the matter was to be agitated by way of suit. This Court by its order dated 3rd January 1952 held that the more appropriate manner in which the proceedings of the appellant under Act XXX of 1947 could be questioned was to challenge the propriety thereof in a separate suit. Respondents 1 to 8 then filed the suit impleading the 9th respondent as a party defendant. Later the 9th respondent was transposed as the 9th plaintiff to the suit. The respondents raised several contentions against the validity of the Government's Order issuing the notification. First it was denied that the village was an estate. Then it was stated that Act XVIII of 1936 itself was void and then it was contended that the suit village should be deemed to be the private or pannai lands of the landholders and therefore no reduction of rent was possible. This last question is the only question in, the present appeal. The appellant contested the suit. It was contended that the lands were ryoti lands in the occupation of tenants, in the written statement the names of 67 tenants were set out as being in actual occupation of the various plots of land. It was also pleaded that there was no valid notice under S. 80, C.P.C and the suit was therefore liable to be dismissed. The learned Subordinate judge held that all the lands were pannai lands and that as there had been a waiver by the Advocate General of a notice under S. 80, C.P.C, the suit was maintainable. In that view, the lower Court passed a decree as prayed for by the respondents. The State has filed the present appeal against the decree of the lower Court.
Learned Government Pleader first contended that the lower Court was in error in regard to the necessity of a notice under S. 80, C.P.C His contention is that the 9th respondent Abdul Rahiman alone was the petitioner in the writ petition to this Court and the concession or the waiver by the Advocate General should be deemed to relate only to a case where that individual brought a suit challenging the validity of the Notification and that such a concession would not avail the other plaintiffs, namely, respondents 1 to 8 to the action. In support of his contention, the learned Government Pleader said that S. 80 was a mandatory provision, which had to be strictly complied with. The learned Subordinate Judge did not accept this contention. He has pointed out that the uncontradicted evidence of P.W 1 in the case was that the 9th respondent filed the writ petition on behalf of all the other co-sharers in representative capacity and that therefore the present suit filed by all the co-sharers eo nomine would not be barred by the provisions of S. 80 C.P.C, having regard to the waiver of the notice by the Advocate General in the writ proceedings. P.W 1 in his evidence has stated that he filed the writ application on behalf of himself and his co-sharers and that he could not join in as plaintiff in that suit as at that time he had gone away to Rangoon. That evidence has not been challenged in cross-examination. Apart from that contention, lam of opinion that the objection to the maintainability of the suit by reason of there having been no notice under S. 80 C.P.C, is not sustainable in the circumstances of the case. It is admitted the property in respect of which the notification (which was challenged in the writ proceedings) was made is the identical property which is the subject matter of the present suit. A writ of certiorari is directed against the record and not against any particular person. The nature of writ jurisdiction has been considered in the judgment of the Supreme Court in Hari Vishnu Kamath v. Syed Ahmed Ishaque and others (1), Venkatarama Aiyar J. observed.
“The writ for quashing is thus directed against a record, and as a record can be brought up only through human agency, it is issued to the person or authority whose decision is to be reviewed.”
In Corpus Juris Secundum, Vol. 14, at Page 123, it is stated.
“The office of certiorari is to bring up the proceedings of the Court below for examination, that they may be affirmed or quashed, and not to enforce any rights growing out of those proceedings, its purpose not being to compel performance.”
Lower down it is stated:
“It is not a proceeding against the Tribunal or an individual composing it; it acts on the cause or proceeding in the lower Court and removes it to the superior Court for re-investigation.”
The nature of the proceedings being one for removal of record before the superior Court and quashing the same when circumstances warrant, it is not a question of adjudication of any right as between two parties to any litigation. It is no doubt true that for the purpose of moving the superior Court to issue the writ the appellant should have an interest in the subject matter. But that does not mean that all the parties interested in the subject of the application should be before the Court, as it is competent for any one of them to move the Court to exercise its superior jurisdiction. In case the superior Court exercises its jurisdiction in proceedings by way of issue of writ of certiorari all the persons interested would be bound by it as the order had been quashed. But that does not necessarily mean that all the persons interested are necessary parties to the writ application. Therefore when the Advocate General waived the notice the waiver should be deemed to be in respect of the notification a record which was impugned in that case and not in respect of any particular party to the writ application. It is well known that in a civil suit all the persons interested in the cause of action should figure as parties to the suit. Therefore when the learned Advocate General waived the notice under S. 80, he should be deemed to have contemplated the possibility of all persons interested in the cause of action being made parties to the suit. I am therefore of opinion that the waiver of notice by the Advocate General would enure for the present suit, although the suit was originally filed by persons other than the applicant for the issue of a writ of certiorari. The learned Government Pleader next contended that the provisions of Act XXX of 1947 would apply, to the suit village and that none of the lands was really pannai or private lands. The suit village consists of 117 acres of wet lands and about 529 cents of dry lands. The case for the respondents is that the entirety of the village formed only private or pannai lands and no portion of it is really ryoti land in respect of which a notification under Act XXX of 1947 would apply. This village, as stated above, was the subject matter of an ancient grant. At the time of the inam settlement, it appears that it came to be owned by more than 80 sharers. Ex. A-1 is the extract from the Fair Inam Register. It shows that the lands were divided and enjoyed by specified shareholders and that there were about 85 share-holders, who were mentioned as being in enjoyment of the lands. That would mean that each of the sharers were in actual enjoyment of about 14 acres odd of nanja and about 28 acres of punja. This extent is certainly one which was manageable in regard to its area and it is posessible that pannai cultivation was feasible by that individual shareholder. The original grant was of both the warams. The village became an estate within the category of estate only by virtue of the Amendment to the Madras Estates Land Act, 1908, by Act XVIII of 1936. The grant being of both the warams, the user of the property prior to 1936 would naturally be of the entire property and mere evidence that the landlords enjoyed both the warams cannot be decisive of the question as to whether any particular land was a ryoti or private land. Some of the considerations or tests applied in Periannan v. A.S Amman Koil , may not strictly apply to such a case. That was a case of an estate within S. 3(2)(e) of the Madras Estates Law Act. The landholder had only the melwaram in the ryoti lands. In such a case the distinction in the treatment between the various lands, the entries in the accounts etc., referred to by the learned Judges would be significant, because the treatment of any particular property as private land as distinct from the treatment of the admitted ryoti land would be of great significance. Such distinction would cat be available in the present case as admittedly the inamdar had both the warams in the land prior to Act XVIII of 1936. In such a case the test to find out whether a property would be private land or ryoti land is given in Govindasami Naidu v. T.P Devastanam . At page 271, their Lordships state:
“We are in entire agreement with the learned Judge that the true test in determining the character of land in such a case is to see whether the landholder intended that he should exercise proprietary right over the land as and when he pleased although he might have let it out to tenants from time to time.”
It may be noticed that in that case the entire village was claimed to be the pannai or private land of the landholder. That contention was accepted by Krishnaswami Nayudu, J., and on appeal by Govinda Men on and Ramaswami, JJ. In finding whether the lands were private lands or ryoti lands the question as to the nature of the property and also the intention of the landholder will have an important bearing. The fact of a landlord being an absentee cannot be decisive in all such cases. It is well known that agricultural operations are only seasonal and regular work is being done only for a few days in the year. During the rest of the season where there are irrigational facilities, it is only a question of supervision and no actual work is done in the fields. In cases where there are no irrigational facilities it is only a question of depending upon the rains. If the actual cultivator can take an assistant or servant and have work done through him, I cannot see any difference in principle why the owner too cannot take a servant and have the agricultural operations conducted through him. The question whether a land is private or not cannot therefore be dicided by the mere fact that the landholder happens to be an absentee landlord. In the present case no inference can be drawn from the fact that originally the landlord was not residing in the village. The learned Subordinate Judge has referred to a number of documents which recite the fact that the lands in the village are what are called bazara. Bazara means that it is uninhabited and banzar means that it is waste land. The learned Subordinate Judge has also referred to the recitals in the various documents which show that the lands were described as pannai iruvaram lands of the landholder. There is also evidence in this case of the various co-sharer landholders dealing with the melwaram and kudiwaram interest in the property from the year 1870. Nearly 150 documents have been filed on the side of the landlords to prove this fact. The learned Subordinate Judge has analysed these documents in paragraphs 12 to 14 of the judgment. This fact is in sharp contrast with what the landlords did in regard to samudayam lands. Under Ex. A.244, they had executed leases of the samudayam property for a period of 7 years. The lessees in turn had been alienating those properties by creating usufructuary mortgages for short periods of time, e.g, three years. Those are evidenced by Exs. B.1 to B.10 Apart from that there is not a single piece of documentary evidence to show that any person other than the landholder had been dealing with the properties as owner of the kudiwaram. This is of great significance particularly after the year 1936, when Act XVIII of 1936 came into force. During all these years, we have got only documents and transactions on the side of the landholders asserting title to the entire interest in the property and stating that they were the owners of both the warams Exs. A.24 and A.25 are two lease deeds filed on behalf of the respondents. They show that after the lease period was over the tenants agreed to surrender possession to the landlord. There is no evidence of any exchange of patta and muchilika in any single instance. In the written statement filed by the appellant reference is made to the existence of 67 ryots on the land. Except P.W 1 no other person has been examined. It is rather a curious circumstance that amongst the ryots mentioned in the written statement Nos. 47, 49 and 50 are really landholders, namely, plaintiffs 6 to 8. P.W 1 has stated in his evidence that there was no habitation in the village and his father for the first time constructed 17 houses in three rows in the form of barracks for housing the farm servants. He also stated that his father built a bungalow for his residence and a small house for the peshkar. There has been no cross-examination on this point. That shows that the cultivation was done with the help of servants, who were given habitation by the landlord. Mr. Kesava Aiyangar has urged before me that the lands were originally only waste lands and the landholder with great difficulty brought labour from outside, had the lands reclaimed and converted them into cultivable lands. Under these circumstances one can readily assume that the intention of the landholder was to cultivate the land himself through hired labour. On this state of evidence, 1 cannot but accept the finding of the learned Subordinate Judge that the lands are the pannai lands belonging to the landholders.
The learned Government Pleader next contended that plaintiffs 6 to 8 have not proved that the lands in their possession were pannai lands. As I pointed out above, Government in the written statement itself stated that they are in actual possession of the respective plots of land. They would have it that they were in possession in their capacity as ryots, while it is now admitted that they are also landholders. There is therefore no substance in the contention advanced on behalf of the appellant that the plaintiffs 6 to 8 have not proved their title.
The result is, the appeal fails and is dismissed with costs.
V.C.S