Finality of remand orders and limits of later statutory change sustain the decree for possession.

A remand order under Order 41 Rule 23 CPC, once made in the same litigation, could not be reopened in the later appeal after remand because finality attached to the earlier interlocutory determination and the trial court remained bound by the remand directions. The Madhya Pradesh Abolition of Proprietary Rights Act, 1950 did not defeat the respondent's recovery claim on the facts found, since the appellants failed to show that the land fell within the statutory bar or that they had been accepted as occupancy tenants by the State. The decree for possession was therefore sustained.

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Issues: (i) Whether a remand order made in the same litigation could be reopened in a later appeal after remand. (ii) Whether the Madhya Pradesh Abolition of Proprietary Rights (Estates, Mahals, Alienated Lands) Act, 1950 defeated the respondent's claim to recover possession of the suit land.

Issue (i): Whether a remand order made in the same litigation could be reopened in a later appeal after remand.

Analysis: A remand order is an interlocutory order. Once it has been made in the course of the same proceedings, the parties cannot re-agitate its correctness before the same appellate court in an appeal arising after remand, where the remand order has governed the scope of the inquiry below. The principle applied is that finality attaches to matters decided at an earlier stage of the same litigation, and the lower court on remand is confined to the limits fixed by the remand directions.

Conclusion: The remand order could not be reconsidered by the learned single Judge in the appeal after remand.

Issue (ii): Whether the Madhya Pradesh Abolition of Proprietary Rights (Estates, Mahals, Alienated Lands) Act, 1950 defeated the respondent's claim to recover possession of the suit land.

Analysis: Although an appellate court may take notice of a change in law occurring after an earlier decision, the later statute had no application on the facts found in this case. The suit was not founded on proprietary title alone, there was no proof that the appellants had been accepted as occupancy tenants by the State, and the record did not establish facts bringing the land within the bar relied on by the appellants. The defence based on the State's supposed title was treated as no answer on the evidence and the cause of action had to be judged as it existed when the suit was instituted.

Conclusion: The statutory change did not defeat the respondent's claim, and the suit was rightly decreed.

Final Conclusion: The appeal was without merit and the decree in favour of the respondent was sustained.

Ratio Decidendi: A remand order under Order 41 Rule 23 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, operates within the same litigation as a final determination of the matter it leaves open, and its correctness cannot be reopened in a later appeal after remand; a subsequent statutory change will not displace the decree unless it directly governs the facts and legal relationship established on the record.

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