Umrao Singh Ajit Singhji and Anr vs Bhagwati Singh Balbir Singh Minor and Ors

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: supreme-court

Case Number: Appeal (civil) 125 of 1952

Decision Date: 11 October, 1954

Coram: Mehar Chand Mahajan, B.K. Mukherjea, V. Bose, B. Jagannadhadas, T.L.V. Aiyy ar

The appeal titled Umrao Singh Ajit Singhji and Anr versus Bhagwati Singh Balbir Singh Minor and Others was decided on 11 October 1954 by the Supreme Court of India. The reported judgment appears in AIR 1956 SC 15 and was delivered by Chief Justice Mehar Chand Mahajan, joined by Justices B. K. Mukherjea, V. Bose, B. Jagannadhadas and T. L. V. Aiyyar. The matter before the Court was an appeal filed under a certificate against the dismissal of a suit by the High Court of Judicature for Rajasthan, Jaipur Branch. The appellants, identified as Umrao Singh, Ajit Singhji and another plaintiff, sought a declaration of their right of succession to the Gaddi of Indergarh, asserting that they were the rightful heirs of the late Maharaja Sumer Singhji.

The factual background revealed that Maharaja Sumer Singhji, the last jagirdar of Indergarh in the Kotah district of Rajasthan, died on 14 July 1949 in Delhi without leaving any male issue. Shortly thereafter, on 2 August 1949, Maharaja Umrao Singh, one of the present appellants, instituted a suit against the respondent, Maharaja Bhagwati Singh, who was a minor, and three additional parties. The suit alleged that, following the death of Maharaja Sumer Singhji without a male heir, the plaintiff was the sole heir and that the minor respondent was falsely claiming to be an adopted son of the deceased in order to succeed to the estate. The defence contended that the adoption had been lawfully effected after obtaining the proper sanction of His Highness the Maharao of Kotah. It further argued that, while Kotah State existed as an independent political entity, the Maharaja of Kotah possessed exclusive authority to recognise successions concerning jagirs, and that after the integration of Rajasthan such authority vested in His Highness the Rajpramukh pursuant to Article 7(3) of the Covenant of Rulers of Rajasthan. Consequently, the defence maintained that the civil courts lacked jurisdiction to adjudicate the dispute. On this submission, the trial court framed the question: whether the Rajpramukh enjoyed an exclusive right to decide the succession of the jagir and whether, as a result, civil courts were barred from hearing the suit. After hearing arguments on this issue, the District Judge rendered a judgment dated 19 December 1949, finding in favour of the respondents and dismissing the plaintiffs’ suit. The High Court of Rajasthan affirmed that decision on appeal. During the pendency of the proceedings, Maharaja Udaibhan Singh, originally a defendant, was impleaded as a plaintiff. The present appeal before the Supreme Court was consequently preferred by both plaintiffs.

Both plaintiffs preferred the appeal. The principal question before the Court was whether a civil court possessed the authority to adjudicate the matter of succession to the Jagir of Indergarh. The relevant statutory provision was Section 9 of the Civil Procedure Code, which states that courts, subject to their own provisions, have jurisdiction to try all suits of a civil nature except those suits whose cognizance is expressly or impliedly barred. The section further explains that a suit in which the right to property or an office is contested remains a civil suit even if the determination of that right depends wholly on questions of religious rites or ceremonies. Counsel for the appellants argued that because the suit filed by the plaintiffs was a civil suit, the civil courts should have been competent to hear it, and that the lower courts had erred in concluding that their jurisdiction was either expressly or implicitly barred. The Court, however, found this argument unpersuasive. While acknowledging that there was no explicit statutory provision prohibiting the civil courts from entertaining such suits, the Court observed that the nature of the dispute implied a bar on their jurisdiction. In paragraph 2 of the plaint, the plaintiffs alleged that, in the absence of a direct male heir to the Gaddi of Indergarh, members of the Chhapol family, sharing the Bhagatsinghot Gotra with the jagirdars of Indergarh, were the closest kin, and that the ruler of Kotah, exercising sovereign authority over Indergarh, had continuously sanctioned their succession. Paragraph 3 further stated that the late Maharaja Sumer Singhji of Thikana Chhapol, with the approval of the Maharao of Kotah, had been recognized as successor to Indergarh upon the death of Maharaja Sher Singh, who left no male issue, and that Maharaja Sher Singh, in the same fashion, had been succeeded by a member of Thikana Chhapol after the death of Maharaja Sangram Singhji, also without a male issue. Consequently, the plaintiffs’ case was based on the contention that succession to the Gaddi of Indergarh was determined by the ruler of Kotah acting in his sovereign capacity. The plaint did not assert that the jagir was hereditary or that the Maharao’s sanction was merely a formality. After the integration of Rajasthan, the sovereign prerogative previously exercised by the Maharao of Kotah regarding succession was transferred to the Rajpramukh under Article 7(3) of the Covenant among the rulers of the various States of Rajasthan, including Kotah. The Covenant reads: “Article VII (3) – Unless other provision is made by an Act of the Legislature of the United State, the right to resume jagirs or to recognise succession, according to law and custom,” thereby vesting the exclusive right to recognize succession in the Rajpramukh.

In the covenant that governed the rights of the jagirdars after the integration of Rajasthan, the parties expressly stated that “to the rights and titles of the jagirdars shall vest exclusively in the Rajpramukh.” Accordingly, the Rajpramukh, exercising the authority given by that provision, issued on 1-12-1949 a formal recognition that Maharaja Bhagwati Singhji, who was the second son of Maharaja Balbir Singhji of Khatoli and the adopted son of the late Maharaja Sumer Singhji of Indergarh, was to succeed the late Maharaja Sahib of Indergarh. The language of the covenant leaves no doubt that the Rajpramukh of Rajasthan alone was competent to decide questions of succession. Because of that, a civil suit could not be entertained to compel a sovereign to perform his duties in a prescribed manner, since the power to recognize an heir to the Gaddi of Indergarh was a political function and an incident of sovereignty, formerly exercised by the Maharao of Kotah and now exercised by the Rajpramukh. Such a matter could not be the subject of adjudication in a civil court. The plaint made no allegation that the jagir in question was a hereditary estate that could not be resumed after the death of its holder, and it did not set out any facts defining the particular incidents of that jagir. Generally, a jagir is an assignment of land or money intended to support a certain dignity and the troops attached to it; it may be conditional or unconditional, is usually granted for the lifetime of the holder and lapses on his death, and may be renewed to an heir upon payment of a nazarana or fine. Occasionally, a jagir is described as hereditary. In the decision of Gulabdas Jugjivandas v Collector of Surat, 3 Bom 186 (A), the Privy Council held that, in the absence of contrary evidence, a jagir must be taken prima facie to be an estate for life, although it may be granted in terms that make it hereditary. Accordingly, because no evidence was presented to show that the Indergarh jagir was irrevocably hereditary, the court was bound to assume that it was resumable after the death of the last holder and that the recognition of the adoption of Bhagwati Singh by the Maharao of Kotah, and later by the Rajpramukh, was an exercise of sovereign rights. Even if the jagir had been hereditary, the Maharao of Kotah was expressly the sole arbitrator for determining succession to the Gaddi according to law and custom, and that exclusive authority had been transferred to the Rajpramukh by the binding force of the covenant. In this context, the rule laid down by the Privy Council in Sultan Sani v. Ajmodin, 20 Ind App 50 (PC), becomes applicable, as it holds that the question of to whom a saranjam or jagir shall be granted after the death of its holder belongs exclusively to the Government, is decided on political considerations, and is not subject to review by any legal tribunal.

The Court expressed the view that the question of to whom a saranjam or a jagir should be granted after the death of its holder belonged exclusively to the Government. It held that such a determination was to be made on the basis of political considerations and therefore lay outside the competence of any legal tribunal. The Court further observed that it was not within the power of the courts to review a decision that the Government might pronounce on that matter. As a result, the Court concluded that the jurisdiction of the civil courts was implicitly excluded from entertaining suits of this character. Because the civil courts could not entertain the dispute, the appeal could not be entertained. Consequently, the appeal was dismissed and the parties were ordered to bear the costs of the proceedings.