KOSHAL - (1.) THE facts forming the background to this appeal by certificate granted by the High Court of Rajasthan against its judgment dated the 29/04/1968, in so ar as they are undisputed, may be stated in some detail. On the 28th Feb, 1948, the Rulers of the erstwhile States of Alwar, Bharatpur, Dholpur and Karauli entered into a Covenant (hereinafter referred to as the Maisya Covenant) ageeing to merge their States into one State know as the United State of Matsya which was to come into being on the 1st of April 1948 with the Ruler of Dholpur as its Raj Pramukh. Article VI of the Coverant provided that the Ruler of each Covenanting State shall, as soon as may be parcticable and in any event not later than the 15/03/1948, make over the administration of his State to the Raj Pramukh and that thereupon all rights, authority and jurisdiction belonging to such Ruler which appertained or were incidental to the government of his State shall vest in the United State of Matsya. Article XI of the Covenant provided for the private properties of the Ruler and ran thus : "1. THE Ruler of each Covenanting State shall be entitled to the full ownership, use and enjoyment of all private properties (as distinct from State properties) belonging to him on the date of his making over the administration of that State the Raj Pramukh. "2. He shall furnish to the Raj Pramukh before the 1/05/1948, an inventory of all the immovable properties, securities and cash balances held by him as such private property. "3. If any dispute arises as to whether any item of property is the private property of the Ruler or State property it shall be referred to such person as the Government of India may nominate and the decision of that person shall be final and binding on all parties concerned." THE United State of Matsya came into being as stiputated in the Matsya Covenant on the 1st of April 1948 and during the same month the Ruler of Alwar, who is the appellant before us, furnished to the Raj Pramukh an inventory of all the immovable properties, securities and cash balances held and claimed by him as his private properties. On the11th of April 1948, the Rulers of ten States, namely, Banswara, Bundi, Dungarpur, Jhalawar, Kishengarh, Kotah, Mewar, Partabgarh, Shahpura and Tonk entered into a covenant agreeing to merge them into one State named the United State of Rajasthan, That Covenant was superseded by another dated the 10th of March 1949 (hereinafter called the Rajasthan Covenant) through which the United State of Rajasthan was to consist of the said ten States as also of four others, namely, Bikaner, Jaipur, Jaisalmer and Jodhpur, with the Ruler of Jaipur as the Raj Pramukh. C. (c) of Art. 1 of the Rajasthan Covenant defined the expression "New Covenanting State" to mean any of the said four States. Art. II of the Covenant last mentioned provided that the United State of Rajasthan would include any other State, the Ruler of which entered into an agreement with the Raj Pramukh, with the approval of the Govt. of India, to the integration of that State with the United State of Rajasthan. Art, XII of the Rajasthan Covenant provided : "(1) THE Ruler of each Covenanting State shall be entitled to the full ownership, use and enjoyment of all private properties (as distinct from State properties), belonging to him on the date of his making over the administration of that State to the Raj Pramukh of the former Rajasthan State or as the case may be, to the Raj Pramukh of the United State under this Covenant. (2) If any dispute arises as to whether any item of property is the private property of the Ruler of a Covenating State other than a new Covenanting State or is State property, it shall be referred to such person as the Government of India may nominate in consultation with the Raj Pramukh, and the decision of that person shall be final and binding on all parties concerned : Provided that no such dispute shall be so referable after the first day of May, 1949. (3) THE private properties of the Ruler of each new Covenanting State shall be as agreed to between the Government of India in the States Ministry and the Ruler concerned, and the settlement of properties thus made shall be final." On the 1st of May 1949, the Rulers of the States of Alwar, Bharatpur, Dholpur and Karauli which were the Constituent States of the United State of Matsya, entered into an agreement (hereinafter called the Amending Agreement with the Raj Pramukh of the United State of Rajasthan merging their four States into it with effect from the 15th of May 1949 in abrogation of the Matsya Covenant. While subscribing to the Amending Agreement the Ruler of Dholpur acted not only in his capacity as such but also as the Raj Pramukh of the United State of Matsya. Article IV of that Agreement effected amendments in the Rajasthan Covenant so as to make it applicable to the said four States with effect from the date last mentioned. No change, however, was made in the provisions of Cl. (c) of Art. I or Art. XII of the Rajasthan Covenant. On the 14th of Sept., 1949, Mr. V. P. Menon of the Ministry of States, Government of India, wrote the following letter to the Ruler of Alwar : "My dear Maharaja Sahib. Your Highness will recall that the inventory of immovable properties, securities and cash balances furnished by Your Highness in accordance with Articles XI of the Convenant for the formation of the United State of Matsya was discussed with Your Highness at New Delhi on the 9th and 10/04/1949. I now forward for Your Highness's information a copy of the final inventory of Your Highness ' private properties. It has the approval of the Government of India in the Ministry of States.
(2.) THE following claims of Your Highness and the counter-claims of the former Matsya Government are still under consideration and the decision will be communicated to Your Highness as soon as possible. (1) cash balance of the Alwar State treasury; (2) claim for Rs. 4,82,520 as arrears of Privy Purse of Your Highness for 6 years from 1936-37 to 1942-43. Your Highness will appreciate that the settlement of the inventory is an integral part of an over-all agreement in respect of all outstanding matters of dispute and does not stand by itself. With kind regards, Yours sincerely, Sd/- (V. P. Menon)" This letter was accompanied by a copy of the "final" inventory which listed 32 items. Reproduced below is the item at serial No. 1 of that inventory; JUDGEMENT_512_1_1979Html1.htm Thereafter, correspondence went on between the Ministry of States and the Ruler of Alwar and on the 24th Sept., 1952 the latter received from the former a written communication dealing with 26 items of properties. The opening clause of Para 2 of the letter stated : "2. The Government of India have carefully considered all the outstanding questions in respect of Your Highness' private properties, in consultation with the Rajasthan Government and their decisions in respect thereof are as follows : The description of each item covered by the letter was followed by the decision in respect thereof. That part of the letter which deals with item 26 is set down below: "(26) City Palace including adjoining buildings:- The City Palace with the adjoining buildings, comprising of the Jagir office, Central Record, Imperial Bank, Treasury, Gandhi National School etc., will be Your Highness ' ancestral property. The secretariat building will however be State property." This decision was reiterated in an office Memorandum issued by the Government of Rajasthan in the Political Department on the 30th of Dec., 1952. Through a letter dated the 14th of Oct., 1959 proceeding from his Private Secretary and addressed to the Chief Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs, Govt. of India, the Ruler of Alwar claimed rent for three properties known as the Secretariat building, Daulat Khan building and Indra Viman Station adjoining the City Palace and the bungalow at Sariska, which were in the occupation of the Rajasthan Government. The claim was made on the ground that all the four properties had been declared to be the private properties of the Ruler in the inventory appended to the letter dated the 14/09/1949 mentioned above. The claim was rejected by the Ministry of Home Affairs which asserted in its letter dated the 24th of December 1959 that the four properties in question had not been recognised as the private properties of the Ruler. The claim was reiterated by the Ruler through a letter issued by Shri Gopesh Kumar Ojha, his legal and Financial Adviser, but the same was again turned down by the Ministry of Home Affairs through their letter dated the 6th/8th of December 1960 in which the position taken was : "The statement regarding the extent of your private property rights in the City Palace area made in our letter D/- 24-12-59 are based upon the decision reached in March 1952 after discussion with your Highness and we regret that they cannot now be reopened." 2. It was zin the above background that the Ruler of Alwar filed two suits, being suits Nos. 4 and 5 of 1963, in the Court of the District Judge, Alwar. In suit No. 5 the prayer made was that the three properties known as the Secretariate building, Daulat Khanna building and Indra Viman Station be declared to be the private properties of the plaintiff and that the State of Rajasthan be ejected therefrom, or, in the alternative, be ordered to pay rent at a specified rate. A decree for Rs. 36,000.00 was also claimed for mesne profits. In suit No. 4 of 1963, the claim was that the plaintiff was entitled to rent or mesne profits in respect of a building forming part of the Mardana Palace. 3. Both the suits were resisted by the Union of India and the State of Rajasthan who were joined as the two defendants to each of them and it was claimed inter alia that the provisions of Art. 363 of the Constitution of India were a complete bar to their maintainability. The two suits were transferred by the High Court of Rajasthan to itself and the question of their maintainability was mooted before it with reference to the provisions of Art. 363 of the Constitution which states : (1) Notwithstanding anything in this Constitution but subject to the provisions or Art. 143, neither the Supreme Court nor any other court shall have jurisdiction in any dispute arising out of any provision of a treaty, agreement, covenant, engagement, sanad or other similar instrument which was entered into or executed before the commencement of this constitution by any Ruler of an Indian State and to which the Government of the Dominion of India or any of its predecessor Governments was a party and which has or has been continued in operation after such commencement, or in any dispute in respect of any right accuring under or any liability or obligation arising out of any of the provisions of this Constitution relating to any such treaty, agreement, covenant, enagement, sanad or other similar instrument. (2) In this article- (a) "Indian State" means any territory recognised before the commencement of this Constitution by His Majesty or the Government of the Dominion of India as being such a State; and (b) "Ruler" includes the Prince, Chief or other person recognised before such commencement by His Majesty or the Government of the Dominion of India, as the Ruler of any Indian State. The High Court proceeded to determine whether the dispute in suit No. 5 of 1963 was one arising of an agreement such as fell within the ambit of Art. 363 (as was contended by the deendants) or was merely a one-sided decision of the Government of India and, therefore, outside the purview of the article as was asserted by the plaintiff. It held that the "decisions" contained in the letter dated the 14th of Sept., 1949 had really resulted from an agreement between the Ministry of States and the plaintiff, that the extent of the building adjoining the City Palace was not to be found with precision in the inventory appended to the said letter, that consequently there was a real dispute between the parties whether the suit property was included in the expression "adjoining building" and that the adjudication of such a dispute was barred by the provision of Art. 363 of the Constitution. Suit No. 5 of 1963 was, therefore, dismissed, but with no order as to costs. In regard to suit No. 4 of 1963, however, the High Court held that the property in dispute was clearly a part of the City Palace itself as it was comprised in the Mardana Mahal, that the dispute was altogether illusory in view of the fact that right up to the 8th of Dec. 1960, the Government of India had been taking the stand that the disputed property was the private property of the plaintiff, that the dispute was consequently not barred by the provisions of Art. 363 of the Constitution, and that the suit, therefore, deserved to be decided by the District Judge on merits. In the result, suit No. 4 of 1963 was remitted to the trial court for decision according to law.
(3.) IT is the judgment of the High Court in suit No. 5 of 1963 alone that is challenged in this appeal. Mr. B. D. Sharma, learned counsel for the appellant Ruler, has vehemently contended that the letter dated the 14th Dec., 1949 was not the result of an agreement between the plaintiff and the Government of India and that, on the other hand, it was a decision arrived at in pursuance of Cl. (3) of Art. XI of the Matsya Covenant. In support of this contention it was pointed out that the letter was issued as a sequel to the inventory furnished by the plaintiff under Cl. (2) of that Article and that the operative part of the inventory appended to the letter is headed "decision of the States Ministry" which, according to learned Counsel, clearly negatives an agreement. It was further urged that even the Rajasthan Covenant did not envisage any agreement in so far as the plaintiff was concerned because he was not the Ruler of a "new Covenanting state" within the meaning of that expression as used in Cls. (2) and (3) of Art. XII thereof, that it was Cl. (2) of that Article which governed him and which again provided for a decision being given on disputes relating to properties and that the letter dated 14th Sept., 1949 must still be construed as a decision if the Matsya Covenant was held to be inapplicable. A careful examination of the material on the record, however, clearly makes out that the contention is without substance as we shall presently show.;