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TMI Blog1953 (4) TMI 27X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ness, amongst others, as banker and financier. On the 30th December, 1949, a bill entitled the Bihar Land -Reforms Bill was passed by the Bihar Legislature and having been reserved for the consideration of the President received his assent on the 11th September, 1950. The Act so passed and assented to was published in the Bihar Gazette on the 25th September, 1950, and was brought into force on the same day by a notification made by the State Government in exercise of powers conferred on it by section 1(3) of the Act. Many of the proprietors and tenure holders of Zamindari estates took proceedings against the State of Bihar for appropriate orders restraining the State Government from taking over the estates under the provisions of the Act which they claimed to be beyond the legislative competency of the Bihar Legislature and otherwise void. On the 12th March, 1951, a Special Bench of the Patna High Court held that the Act was unconstitutional on account of its contravention of article 14 of the Constitution. The State of Bihar appealed to this Court. Pending that appeal, the provisional Parliament passed the Constitution (First Amendment) Act, 1951. The respondents in the main ap ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... e Bihar Legislature could make a law for acquiring Zamindari estates of incorporated companies it did not, by the Act, in fact do so. Section 3 authorises the State Government to declare by notification that the estates or tenures of a proprietor or tenure-holder have passed to and become vested in the State. It will be recalled that it was under this section that the State Government on the 6th November, 1951, issued the notifications with respect to the estates of the appellants situate within the State. Mr. P. R. Das s principal contention is that the appellant companies do not come within the terms, proprietor or tenure holder as defined by the Act and consequently no part of their estates were intended to be vested or did in fact vest in the State. Proprietor is defined by section 2(o) as meaning a person holding in trust or owning for his own benefit an estate or a part of an state and includes the heirs and successors-in-interest of a proprietor and, where a proprietor is a minor or of unsound mind or an idiot, his guardian, committee or other legal curator. Tenure-holder is defined by section 2 (r) as meaning a person who has acquired from a proprietor or from any ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... at the provisions of the Indian Companies Act should not be imported into the consideration of the provisions of his Act. He relies primarily on the case of Pharmaceutical Society v. The London and Provincial Supply Association, Limited (1880) L.R. 5 App. Cas. 857 whore it was held,that a corporation did not come within the word person used in the Pharmacy Act, 1868 (31 32 Vic., Chapter 121). Reliance was placed upon the observations of Lord Selborne L.C. at page 863. The preamble to that Act recited, amongst other things, that it was expedient for the safety of the public that persons keeping open shop for the retailing, dispensing or compounding of poisons, and persons known as chemists and druggists should possess a competent practical knowledge of their business. This clearly comtemplated persons skilled in matters pharmaceutical and not impersonal corporate bodies which would know nothing about that particular business. Indeed, Lord Blackburn in his speech in the House of Lords in the Pharmaceutical Society s case (188o) L.R. 5 App. Cas. 857 referred to this preamble and observed at page 870:- Stopping there, it is quite plain. that those who used that language were ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... as we apprehend it, that decision lays down nothing beyond that. In support of his contention that a company owning an estate was never intended to be affected by the Act, Mr.P. R. Das draws our attention to the winding up sections of the Indian Companies Act and urges that it is not possible to fit in the scheme of winding up into the scheme of the Bihar Act. If the Zamindari assets of the company are taken over and compensation is paid by non-transferable bonds it will, he contends, be impossible, to apply the law of winding up in case the company goes into liquidation. There will, according to him, be conflict of jurisdiction between the Court where the winding up is proceeding, which may conceivably be in another State, land the Bihar Government and its officers. We see no force in this contention. Upon a notification being issued under section 3, the Zamindari estate will vest in the State and the company will cease to have any interest in it. Its only right will be to receive compensation. In case of winding up the liquidator will have to pursue the remedy provided by this Act. He or the company will be in no worse position than the official assignee or official receiver ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... sting by a written order served in the prescribed manner to require a proprietor or tenureholder or any other person in possession of such an estate or tenure or any agents or employees of such proprietor, tenure-holder or other person to produce at a time and place specified in the order such documents, papers or registers or to furnish such information relating to such estate or tenure as such officer may from time to time require for any of the purposes of this Act. A wilful failure or neglect to comply with such order would clearly bring the recalcitrant officer or agent of the company within the penalty provided under section 41. Section 41 therefore, does not necessarily preclude the application of the Act to incorporated companies. It cannot be denied that a company is competent to own and hold property. The whole. object of the impugned Act is thus stated by Mahajan J. in the State of Bihar v. Kameshwar Singh [1952] S.C. R. 889 at p. 941: Now it is obvious that concentration of big blocks of land in the hands of a few individuals is contrary to the principle on which the Constitution of India is based. The purpose of the acquisition contemplated by the impugned Act ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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