BALIJEPALLI RAMAKOTI SURYANARAYANA TANODAR Vs. KAMPALLI RAMACHENDRUDU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In summary Suit No. 448 of 1916 on the file of the Deputy Collector, Nidadavole--the landholder obtained a decree for rent against 6 defendants. Subsequently, the landholder applied to the Court of the Deputy Collector for attachment and sale of 150 acres in R.S. field No. 567 and attachment was made on 8 September 1908. Thereupon, R. Ramchandrudu put in a claim petition in the Deputy Collector's Court Under Order 21, Rule 58, Civil P.C., on the ground that the property attached was in his possession and enjoyment, and that the judgment debtor had nothing to do with the same. But the landholder decree-holder filed a counter petition pointing out that rent due to him being the first charge on the holding any transfer made subsequent to the date of the arrears could not save the transferred part of the holding from being liable for the arrears and that the claim was further unsustainable as the claimant had bought the property from the prior raiyats subsequent to the decree.

(2.) The Deputy Collector came to the conclusion that the holding, on which the arrears which were the subject matter of the suit accrued, consisted of 14 survey numbers with an area of 48.31 acres that it was evident from Ex. D series that the landholder had issued receipts to L. Veerasami for rent due in respect of two of the survey numbers included in the original holding, that the claimant had purchased from the vendee of Veerasami a portion and another portion from Veerasami himself and that the land-holder had accepted rent for the said two survey numbers from the claimant himself. The learned Deputy Collector inferred from the circumstances and from the documents filed in the case that the land holder recognized the transfer then prior to the suit by collecting rent from Veerasami on the transferred portion. Being therefore of opinion that the land in the claimant's possession was not liable to attachment in execution of the decree obtained by the land-holder against defendants 1 to 6, counter-petitioners Nos. 2 to 7, as the same had been transferred to the claimant's vendor long before the accumulation of the arrears of the holding and that the land-holder had recognized the transfer and accepted the transferee as his raiyats he allowed the claim. The land holder has preferred this Civil Revision Petition against that order.

(3.) On behalf of the petitioner it was contended before me that having regard to the previsions of Section 5, Estates Land Act, which gives the land-holder a first charge upon holding for the rent due, and to the provisions of Section 132 of the Act, it was not open to the lower Court to entertain the claim petition and that though the point was not taken in the lower Court, yet, as the objection related to want of jurisdiction in the lower Court to entertain the claim petition, the petitioner was entitled to raise the question for the first time in revision and it was submitted that the lower Court's order should be reversed and the claim petition dismissed on the ground of want of jurisdiction in the Court to entertain it.