(PROVINCE COURT)

HEIRS OF TAHIR ABDALLA AND OTHERS V. ABDALLA MAHGOUB AND OTHERS

(NPC/Revisions/38-47/56)

Principles

·  Land law—Unsettled river-bed land—Allottees on temporary basis can acquire title.

By a settlement decision of 1953, certain river-bed lands were registered to applicants. Respondents’ appeal against this decision was summarily dismissed by the settlement officer on the ground that they were paying rent to the Government and that they had no land in the vicinity. Respondents brought actions in El Darner District Court. The District Judge held that although the respondents’ possession was initially temporary in nature, yet by the passage of time it had become fairly permanent and that therefore the respondents were entitled to the land.
Held: That the decision of the District Judge was right, and that, the respondents having been allotted these lands on account of their poverty, and having occupied and lived upon them for a period of twenty years, it was only equitable that they should continue to do so.
Note by Stanley-Baker J. in Sortot Settlement Appeals 86/1955 followed.

Revision

June 28, 1956. A. M. Imam P.J.: —The applicants (defendants) in the following Darner District Civil Suits and respective Revisions are asking for the decrees passed in these suits to be set aside and the lands in dispute to be awarded to them on the grounds that they and not respondents are entitled because of ancestral ownership. These suits and respective revisions are:

Civil suit    Revision

166/54       38/56

190/54       39/56

192/54       40/56

194/56       41/56

195/54       42/56

196/54       43/56

20/55         44/56

22/55         45/56

37/55         46/56

38/55         47/56  

From the various records, which the court inspected, it appeared that these lands (now known as Sagias 47 and 48 El Gubba) were, prior to unsettled riverbed lands. In 1953 these lands were subject tosettlement, which closed on 40-4-1954 (see relevant file). The then Registration Officer awarded these lands among others to applicants on ancient ownership and by prescription since 1927. Respondents (plaintiffs) appealed to the Settlement Officer who summarily dismissed their petition on the grounds that their possession was admittedly on payment of rent to the Government and that they were parachutists with no lands in the vicinity. Again the respondents (plaintiffs) who seem to have been in possession of the land -(and many others) affected a rain of petitions appealing against the above-mentioned settlement decision. These complaints were ultimately reduced to Revisions 69/53, 1/54 2/54 and 18/54. The former revision deals with the proceedings now in question.

In that revision, Stanley-Baker J. allowed respondents’ application for leave to appeal on the grounds that the Government is having forfeited its rights to the title of the lands in dispute. The combat becomes one between the parties themselves, and as no evidence was heard by the Settlement Officer the respondents on being heard as to their possession may well prove that they were better entitled. It was therefore his opinion that in all events the parties must be heard.

The record was taken over by Bedn J. who, after hearing the parties and obtaining a clear sketch-map showing each individual plot, directed that each claimant should raise a separate suit in respect of the piece of land claimed by him. Hence these El Darner District Civil cases. It is noteworthy that respondents at first included both Sagias and 6 into their claim but they seem to have confined themselves to Sagias 47 and 48 when the dispute was referred into the District Court.

This brings us to consider the judgment passed by the court below on March 13. 1956, covering all cases. The District Judge correctly found on the evidence that plaintiffs (respondents), who were masakeen, were in possession of the same, more or less, of their respective pieces of land since 1927—1928 up to 1953. Though possession was apparently temporary in nature as it was subject to frequent redistribution by the administrative authorities, yet again the District Judge was correct in reaching the conclusion that it was fairly permanent. He wrote: “A temporary cultivation order is deemed to confer a temporary right and not a permanent one. Femporary in itself, (it) should cover a reasonably short time and auto matically keeps diminishing as year after year go on until it reaches a stage which is wholly inconsistent with temporariness.” By which I take him to mean that possession though temporary in nature at its initiation would turn to a fairly permanent possession by long endurance or continuity. This opinion is a correct opinion on which many of the successful settlements in this Province were based. This view is upported by the illustrious note drawn by Stanley-Baker J. in connection with Sortot Settlement Appeals No. 86/1955 of March 29, r955 in which he says in his

 الكتابفي(7) رقمالصفحةتقابلوالمعدومة الصفحات ايةبد

‘xposltion ot chances of success of allottees to river-bed land on general ( grOUn(lS ‘ \lorcover on equitable grounds river conditions having become established and occupants or their predecessors having been in I)OSse;siOn of much the same land for a very long time, the occupants will clearly succeed because:

(i) it would be a considerable hardship to disturb such long possession involving working of the land for many years,

(? although temporary in origin the allotment became recognised as more or less perniafleflt.

(3) the likelihood ol a change in river conditions such as might com pensate the occupants br the loss of this land is remote.”

Paragraph ( is irrelevant in this case as respondents though para (hutists yet they arc rnlscikcen and not compensation allottees whose case the note seeks to treat.

Again the note goes on to say: For it appears that the occupants may be able to prove th they have been in possession of the same lands for more than twenty years, the river conditions have become more or less established during this period and that their temporary allotments have thus in course of time become quasi-permanent.”

Though the evidence did not tackle river conditiønS at the site, yet I take it that it has been established as the land in existence since 1927. In fact these claims are a typical illustration of the exan in question:

the respondents who were allotted these lands because of their poverty lived, fed and reproduced on them for nearly twenty years and as I see it it is only equitable that they continue doing so. For the above reasons I think that these revisions should be dismissed

  (Applications dismissed)