[These petitions first came on for hearing on the 29th day of November 1916, before their Lordships Ayling and Seshagiri Aiyar, JJ.]

Ayling, J.

These petitions involve the consideration of a single point only, but one of great and far-reaching importance, namely, whether the Tanjore Palace Estate is an estate within the meaning of Sect. 3 (2) of the Madras Estates Land Act, I of 1908.

The suits out of which they arise were filed under the provisions of Sect. 77 of that Act in the Court of the Revenue Sub-Divisional Officer of Kumbakonam. No question of jurisdiction was raised in that Court; but, on appeal to the District Judge, the latter, apparently of his own initiation, raised the point, and decided that the Tanjore Palace Estate was not an estate within the meaning of the Madras Estates Land Act: and that, in consequence, the Revenue Court had no jurisdiction. He accordingly returned the plaints for representation to the proper Court. This is the order which is sought to be revised.

The District Judge relied solely on a recent unreported decision of a Bench of this Court, in Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913, which, on the face of it, is clear authority on the point. The petitioners vakil was forced to contend that the decision was wrong: and some argument was addressed to us on both sides regarding this. Speaking for myself, 1 do not think I should have felt justified, as a result of that argument, in refusing to follow that decision, if it had been reported in the authorised series. But at the very end of the argument, we found that the learned Judges had declined to allow the case to be reported on the ground that it had not been fully argued. In these circumstances, we felt some difficulty as to the best course to adopt. The argument addressed to us was certainly not of such a nature that we should like to base the decision of an important point on it. Both the learned vakils were clearly to some extent influenced by the existence of the previous decision. I should not be prepared to come to a different conclusion without a much more exhaustive consideration of the question. The importance of the point has already been referred to. The Tanjore Palace Estate embraces nearly 200 villages and extends over a large tract of country. I believe it has been assumed, from the very enactment of Act I of 1908, that it came within the scope of the latters operation as an estate: and the number of decisions of this and Subordinate Courts based on this assumption must be very large. In fact the dislocation and confusion which would be the logical result of the unreported decision being followed are so great, that the necessity of resort to legislation might have to be considered.

In these circumstances I think we are justified in referring the question to a Full Bench and would state it as follows: -

Whether the Tanjore Palace Estate is an estate within the meaning of Sect. 3 (2) of Act I of 1908

Seshagiri Aiyar, J. - The short point is whether the Tanjore Palace Estate is an estate within the meaning of that expression in Sect. 3 (2) of Act I of 1908. There can be no doubt that it is not covered by Cls. ( a ), ( b ), ( c ) and ( e ). Does it come under Cl. ( d ) The proprietor, by whatever name he might have been known in the past, does not own the kudivaram right in the village in his possession. It is conceded that the grant to him was only of the land revenue. It was a grant, if any, by the British Government. The further question is whether the villages were granted in inam . Before dealing with this question, it may be stated that it is not conceded that there was any grant by the Government. Mr. G. S. Ramachandra Aiyar suggested that it was a case of a retention of a portion of the Raj and the relinquishment of the rest to the British Government. It may also be put the other way. See Hickeys book on the Tanjore Palace Estate, Appendix C3, and also Jijoyiamba Bayi Saiba v. Kamakshi Bayi Saiba (3 M.H.C.R., 424). Assuming that there was a grant, was it an Inam grant

In Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913, Sadasiva Aiyar and Napier, JJ., held that the villages belonging to the estate did not come under clause ( d ). In that case the point was conceded in the Courts below and was only incidentally raised in the High Court. Consequently the question was not fully argued. I was informed by one of the learned Judges that the decision requires reconsideration. The other learned Judge in refusing to give permission to publish the decision in the Indian Law Reports has left a note that the case was not fully argued. None the less, the decision has been followed by the District Judge in the present case; and we are informed that a large number of cases await the decision of this case.

The matter in controversy relates to the meaning to be attached to the term granted in Inam. The learned Judges inclined to the view that, unless there is the incident of resumability, there can be no Inam. The meaning given in Wilsons Glossary does not support this view. In Unide Rajaha Raje Bommarauze Bahadur v. Pemmasamy Venkatadry Naidoo (7 M.I.A., 128, 138), the Judicial Committee seem to contemplate an Inam which may not be resumed.

I am not prepared to accept Mr. Krishnaswami Aiyars contention that there can be no Inam unless it be conferred by the Government. I do not understand Raghojirao Saheb v. Lakshmanrao Saheb (I.L.R., 36 Bom., 639) laying down such a proposition. The learned vakil argued that it is of the essence of an Inam that it is permanent. It may be that permanency and heritability attach to an Inam so long as it is not resumed. The observations of Bhashyam Aiyangar, J., in Gunnaiyan v. Kamatchi Ayyar (I.L.R., 26 Mad., 339), were relied upon for the proposition that the Government has no right to resume even a service Inam. As at present advised, I am not prepared to accede to this proposition. What was held in that case was that by the enfranchisement there was no resumption and regrant. I do not understand that decision as laying down that the Government could not have resumed the land under any circumstances. See Boddupalli jagannadham v. The Secretary of State for India in Council (I.L.R., 27 Mad., 16) and Subramanian Chettiar v. The Secretary of State for India in Council ([1915] M.W.N., 276) and Tadikonda Buchi Virabhadrayya v. Sonti Venkanna ([1913] M.W.N., 782).

On the other hand, there is no authority for saying that, unless a grant possesses the characteristics of resumability, it should not be regarded as an inam. In the fifth Report of the Madras Presidency, Volume II, page 14, the nature of the Inam or beneficial grant is stated at some length. It is clear that the Moghul Government made non-resumable Inam grants. That the British Government, in the earlier years of its administration, granted many Inams is evident from numerous grants made by them. This practice was objected to by the Board of Directors in 1822 and 1829, and was practically abandoned since then. There is no reason for supposing that the grants by the British Government always partook of the character of resumability.

It is not necessary to discuss the matter much further, as, in my opinion, the question is one of great importance and should be settled by a Full Bench of this Court.

I agree, therefore, that the question suggested by my learned brother should be referred to the decision of a Full Bench.

[These Civil Revision Petitions then came on for hearing, in pursuance of the above order on the loth day of January 1917, before the Full Bench as constituted above].

John Wallis, C.J.

[1] The repealed Rent Recovery Act VIII of 1865 contained in Section 1 a comprehensive definition of "land-holders," and proceeded to regulate the relations of certain classes of land-holders enumerated in Section 3 with their tenants, as those holding under them were called, leaving other land-holders unrestricted. The classes who were made the subject of this special legislation were broadly speaking, with one exception, assignees of land revenue, and ordinary Government ryots paying the full assessment direct to Government were unaffected. In the present Act the line is drawn by the definition of estate in Section 3(2) which has been adapted from the definition of estate in Section 4 of the Madras Proprietary Estates Village Service Act II of 1894. Clause (d) restricts the operation of the Act by including only the inams therein mentioned thereby excluding the so-called minor inams, but the definition as a whole clearly shows the general intention of the legislature to include all large estates held directly under Government, and Clause (e) extends it to estates consisting of one or more villages not held directly under Government but as a permanent under-tenure. The presumption therefore is that it was the intention of the legislature to apply the provisions of the Act to the numerous villages constituting the Tanjore Palace Estate, though it is of course necessary to show that they come within one or other of the classes of the definition. The villages in question formed part of the territories of the Rajah of Tanjore as to which he agreed by the treaty of 1799 to cede the collection of the revenues and the administration of justice to the East India Company. By some arrangement come to at the time the Company refrained from enforcing its rights under the treaty to the revenue of these villages, and they remained in the enjoyment of the Rajahs until the death of the last Rajah when his territories were taken possession of on behalf of the Crown by an Act of State, It was expressly decided in The Secretary of State v. Kamachee Boye Sahiba (1859) 7 M.I.A. 476 that these villages, forming the so-called private estate of the Rajah, then became the property of Government; and some years later they were granted as a matter of grace and favour to the widows of the late Raja and after them, to his daughter, or failing her his next heirs, as held by this Court in Jijoyiamba Bayi Saiba v. Kamakshi Bayi Saiba (1868) 3 M.H.C.R. 424, p. 444. It is admitted that the kudivaram right in the suit village, and in almost all the other villages, does not belong to the estate; and these villages are therefore villages of which the land revenue alone has been granted by the British Government to persons not owning the kudivaram right, and they therefore come within Clause (d) if they can be said to have been granted "in inam" within the meaning of the section. The definition of the word, inam in Wilson s Glossary expressly covers irresumable revenue-free grants or assignments of revenue such as this. The word "Inam" as held by the Privy Council in Raghojirao Saheb v. Lakshmanrao Saheb (1912) I.L.R. 36 B. 639 (P.C.) is a term of wide signification, wide enough, as held in G. Sam v. Ramalinga Mudaliar (1916) 30 M.L.J. 600 to include jaghirs which however are separately mentioned in Clause (c) of the definition. The meaning of the term jaghir is discussed in that case, and I agree with the observation of Courts Trotter, J., that all jaghirs are a species of inams though there are many kinds of inams that are not jaghirs. The terms jaghir and jaghirdar were terms of some dignity, and were used in the grants themselves or by the grantees for that reason. The grant now in question appears to have been commonly spoken of as a mokhasa grant, and though it cannot be said to have been granted on what is understood as mokhasa tenure, the use of the word goes to show that it was regarded as an inam of a dignified character. There was no distinctive word for a peculiar inam of this kind, and it was probably thought better to use the word mokhasa though not strictly applicable rather than to describe the grantees merely as inamdars, a term which includes large numbers of petty grantees in very humble circumstances. There is, in my opinion, no sufficient ground for supposing that it was intended to exclude from the operation of Section 3(2)(d) grants which were irresumable as the fact that they were irresumable would not be a ground for excluding them having regard to the policy of the Act. I am not satisfied that the Rules for the adjudication and settlement of Inam lands of 1859 have any bearing on this question. Under Rule 4 personal or subsistence grants, such as this, if inquired into, would have simply been confirmed according to their tenor, that is to say as revenue-free and irresumable. However this may be, I do not think these rules afford any ground for patting a restrictive construction on the word inam as used by the legislature in the Act of 1908, especially when the result of so doing would be to exclude from the operation of the Act a large estate which there is no other reason for excluding. I would answer the question in the affirmative.

Sadasiva Aiyar, J.,

[2] I take it that, though the question referred to us is as regards the whole of the Tanjore Palace Estate consisting among other things of about 190 villages, our answer is to be confined to the Mokhasa Ullikadai village within whose limits are situated all the subject-matters of the suits out of which these revision petitions have arisen. As regards this village, it seems to have been conceded by the respondents Vakil before the referring Bench that the land revenue alone belonged to the Tanjore Palace Estate. I concur entirely with my Lord as regards the whole Estate that there was a new grant in 1862 to the Rajah s senior widow by the British Government. That new grant related to the Government Revenue alone (according to the admission above mentioned) so far as the arable lands of the Ullikadai village were concerned.

[3] The next question is whether the grant of the revenue of this village can be called a grant in inam by the British Government and whether the definition of Estate found in Clause 2 (d) of Section 3 of the Madras Estates Land Act applies to this village. I concurred with Mr. Justice Napier in his judgment in Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913 in which he held that in the phrase granted in inam, the word inam should be given a definite and restricted meaning which (according to my said learned brother) that word had acquired in the Madras Presidency since the days of the first Inam Settlement. That restricted and definite meaning (if I understood his judgment aright) was a grant of lands or land revenue made in such a manner that a reversionary right could be claimed by the British Government in the subject of the grant on the occurrence of certain events. As no such reservation was intended in the case of the grant of revenue of any of the villages of the Tanjore Palace Estate, we held in Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913 that it did not consist of villages whose revenues were granted in inam . The Government never seems to have contemplated the registration of these villages as inam villages or to include them in the list of inam villages to be entered in the Registration Records relating to such villages. There seems to have been no intention to instruct the Inam Commissioners or the Inam Settlement Officers to deal with any of these Palace Estate villages by way of confirmation or of modification of the grant of 1862.

[4] No doubt, the word inam means "gift or benefaction" in the widest and most popular sense of that Arabic term which has passed practically into every one of the Vernacular languages of India. It is a gift by a superior to an inferior and is applied in popular language to any gift, whether of moveables or immoveables and of however petty a value. But it has also got several restricted meanings, such restricted meanings, varying in different parts of India. Wilson says, "In India, and especially in the south, and amongst the Marathas, the term was specially applied to grants of land held rent-free, and in hereditary and perpetual occupation." Then he says "the tenure came in time to be qualified by the reservation of a portion of the assessable revenue, or by the exaction of all proceeds exceeding the intended value of the original assessment." He says further on that "the term was also vaguely applied to grants of rent-free land without reference to perpetuity or any specified conditions." He likewise mentions very numerous distinctions among the tenures called "Inams" (see also pages 38 to 41 of Mr. Rama Doss Book on the Estates Land Act).

[5] It is thus clear that when a Madras Statute uses the word inam , it does not signify a gift of whatever kind of property by a superior individual of whatever status to an inferior. Some restriction of the above very wide general significance being assumed (the Inam rules found in the Board s Standing Orders, Vol. 2, para. 52, the Proceedings of the Inam Commissioner and Act IV of 1862, all these also evidently implying such a qualification), Mr. Justice Napier s opinion was that the legislature when talking of a grant "in inam" could have had in its contemplation only a grant in the subject of which the Government had retained some reversionary interest to be enforced in certain contingencies. I am free to admit that the knowledge of my learned brother Mr. Justice; Napier as regards revenue matters and revenue Regulations and his long official experience of such questions (through official contact with the higher Revenue Officer of the Government) being mush more extensive than I could profess to claim, I without much hesitation deferred to his opinion on the question. Even after the full arguments which I have heard in this Full Bench Reference, I cannot say that the view which Napier, J., and myself took in Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913 is wholly unsupportable.

[6] But as my Lord the Chief Justice whose experience and whose knowledge of the history, policy and progress of the legislation which resulted in the passing of the Madras Estates Land Act is, if I may say so with respect, unique, is of opinion that the legislature could not have intended in the definition in Clause (d) of Section 3(2) to exclude villages in the granted revenues of which the Government reserved no reversionary interest, I agree that the opinion contra expressed in the decision in Second Appeal No. 2661 of 1913 should be overruled especially because (as pointed out by Mr. Justice Ayling in his referring judgment) the preponderating balance of convenience is in favour of not restricting unduly the meaning of the phrase "granted in inam".

Seshagiri Aiyar, J.,

[7] The further arguments addressed to us have confirmed me in the view I took in the Order of Reference. I entirely agree with the opinions expressed by the learned Chief Justice.