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Issues: (i) Whether the second proviso to section 88(1)(b) of the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1948 operated retrospectively so as to divest the tenant of the status and rights of a deemed purchaser; (ii) whether a sale by the son of the joint family karta during the father's lifetime, without authority from a competent court in a case of alleged lunacy, could defeat the tenant's statutory purchase rights.
Issue (i): Whether the second proviso to section 88(1)(b) of the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act, 1948 operated retrospectively so as to divest the tenant of the status and rights of a deemed purchaser.
Analysis: The statutory scheme created a deemed purchase in favour of the tenant on tillers' day, while section 88(1)(b) and its provisos dealt with exemption of notified areas reserved for non-agricultural or industrial development. The first proviso was treated as operating on added areas as well, so that the Act would cease to apply and be deemed never to have applied to such areas. The second proviso, however, was construed as protecting transfers or acquisitions in the newly added area made after the relevant notification and before the specified cutoff date, but only where the transfer was valid and bona fide. A proviso cannot be used to destroy the main enactment beyond its proper field, and it could not be read to nullify a vested statutory right unless the language clearly compelled that result. A subsequent notification could not divest a right already crystallised in favour of the tenant where the statutory exception did not validly attach.
Conclusion: The second proviso did not retrospectively divest the appellant of the statutory right of deemed purchaser.
Issue (ii): Whether a sale by the son of the joint family karta during the father's lifetime, without authority from a competent court in a case of alleged lunacy, could defeat the tenant's statutory purchase rights.
Analysis: Under Hindu law, the karta is the natural manager of joint family property, and a junior member cannot ordinarily alienate such property as manager during the karta's lifetime unless special circumstances exist or lawful authority is obtained. On the facts found, the father remained the karta and there was no order from a competent court under the Lunacy Act appointing the son as manager. The sale was therefore not a valid alienation by a person competent to convey the property, and it was treated as an attempt to defeat the tenant's statutory right. Since the transfer was not a valid and bona fide transfer within the meaning of the second proviso, the proviso could not be invoked to defeat the appellant's claim.
Conclusion: The sale could not defeat the appellant's statutory rights and the transfer was inapplicable for the purpose of the second proviso.
Final Conclusion: The appellant's deemed purchaser rights survived, the impugned sale and the exemption-based objection failed, and the orders adverse to the appellant were set aside while the Mamlatdar's order was restored.
Ratio Decidendi: A proviso to an exemption provision cannot be construed to retrospectively destroy a vested statutory tenancy right unless the transfer relied upon is legally valid and bona fide; an unauthorised alienation by a junior coparcener cannot defeat the tenant's deemed purchase under the tenancy statute.
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