R.M Sahai, J.— This appeal filed by a tenureholder, from the State of Maharashtra, has questioned the manner of calculation of ceiling area under Section 3(3)(i) of the Maharashtra Agricultural Lands (Ceiling on Land Holdings) Act, 27 of 1961 (as amended by Act 21 of 1975) (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Act’).
2. What was claimed by the tenureholder was that he had two unmarried daughters on the relevant date. Therefore, the ceiling authority, while calculating the ceiling area of the family, should have taken into account the liability of the family for the maintenance and marriage expenses of these daughters. And their share in the land should have been notionally worked out and so much of the area, as would have been found sufficient for their maintenance, should have been excluded while determining the ceiling area of the appellant. The basis for such claim was a decision given by the Bombay High Court in Manaklal Nathamal v. State of Maharashtra 1982 Mah LJ 654. It was held that at the time of carving out a notional clause in terms of Section 3(3)(i) of the Ceiling Act, what the ceiling authority has to do is to notionally ascertain the shares of the coparceners as the civil court would have done at the time of passing of a partition decree. This conclusion was reached by the learned Judge on a strength of a Privy Council decision in M.A Rajagopala Ayyar v. M.A Venkataraman AIR 1947 PC 122 wherein it was observed that the right of an unmarried daughter in maintenance and marriage expenses out of the joint family property is in lieu of a share on partition; provision should accordingly be made for her marriage expenses in the partition decree. The Division Bench of the High Court, however, did not agree with it as this decision had not been agreed by another learned Judge of the same Court in Bhagwandas Heda v. State of Maharashtra 1983 Mah LJ 825. The Division Bench agreed with the decision in Heda case 1983 Mah LJ 825 that ‘the correct legal position under Section 3(3)(i) of the Ceiling Act is that while calculating the extent of share which the members of a family unit are entitled to hold, the claim of the unmarried daughters to maintenance and marriage expenses are not required to be taken into account’.
3. Section 3(3)(i) of the Act reads as under:
“3. (3) Where any land—
(a) is held by a family of which a person is a member,
and the holding of such person or of a family unit of which such person is a member including the extent of share of such person, if any, in the land answering to any of the descriptions in clauses (a), (b), (c) or (d) above exceeds the ceiling area on or before the commencement date or any date thereafter (hereinafter referred to as the relevant date), then for purpose of determining the ceiling area and the surplus land in respect of that holding, the share of such person in the land aforesaid shall be calculated in the following manner—
(i) in the land held by a family of which the person is a member, the share of each member of the family shall be determined so that each member, who is entitled to a share on partition shall be taken to be holding separately land to the extent of his share, as if the land had been so divided and separately held on the relevant date;.”
This section provides method of calculation of the ceiling area of a family. It provides for determination of the land held by each member of the family and then for clubbing together of the shares of such members who form a family unit and then to determine the ceiling and the surplus area of the tenureholder. A family unit in Explanation to Section 4(1), means—
“(a) a person and his spouse (or more than one spouse) and their minor sons and minor unmarried daughters, if any; or
(b) where any spouse is dead, the surviving spouse or spouses, and the minor sons and minor unmarried daughters; or
(c) where the spouses are dead, the minor sons and minor unmarried daughters of such deceased spouses.”
The ceiling area under Section 4 has to be determined of each member of a family unit, whether jointly or separately. Since the family unit under Section 4 consists of the tenureholder, his spouses and minor sons and minor unmarried daughters, it obviously excludes the major sons and the major daughters from the ambit of family unit for purposes of determination of ceiling area. In fact that provision is beneficial to a tenureholder. The family for purposes of determination of surplus area has been restricted to husband, wife and minor children only. If the submission of the learned counsel for the appellant is accepted, and a major unmarried daughter is also held to be a member of the family unit for determination of ceiling area, it may cause hardship in a large number of cases where a major unmarried daughter is a tenureholder in her own right. It is, therefore, not in the interest of the tenureholders to construe the section in the manner suggested by the learned counsel for the appellant.
4. Apart from it, the language of the section being clear, it does not require any interpretation or construction. The court's function of ascertaining the legislative intention arises only if there is any ambiguity in the provision or the literal construction of a provision may be contrary to the legislative purpose or objective or may result in disastrous consequences. On the plain reading of the section, a notional working out of the share of each member of the family is required to be (sic made) only of those members who are entitled to a share on partition. The significance of the expression ‘entitled to a share on partition’ cannot be lost sight of. An unmarried daughter may be entitled for maintenance and marriage expenses, but she was not entitled to a share on partition either under the customary Hindu law or even under the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 or Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956. Therefore, a daughter being not entitled to a share on partition, the notionally working out of her share under Section 3(3)(i) stands legislatively excluded. In either case, an unmarried major daughter having not been included by the legislature in the definition of ‘family unit’ and for very good reasons the claim of the appellant that the calculation done by the ceiling authorities suffers from any error of law or is unfair does not appear to be well founded.
5. In the result, the appeal fails and is dismissed. But there shall be no order as to costs.