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Lachmi Narain vs Ram Sarup And Anr.

High Court Of Judicature at Allahabad|17 June, 1915

JUDGMENT / ORDER

JUDGMENT Tudball, J.
1. This is a plaintiff's appeal which arises out of a suit brought by him in an attempt to maintain his right of easement. The map tiled with the plaint will explain the case. The plaintiff's case was that there was a hole in the wall between his compound and the compound of the defendants, that through this hole the rain water which fell in his compound and also the rain water which came from the roof of the house of one Mohammad Raza Khan and also the daily dirty water used in his house used to flow, through the mohri A on to the defendants' land and thence to the public drain which runs in front of defendants' house, that this easement had been in existence for many many years and that shortly before the suit the defendants had blocked up the hole with stones and bricks and thus prevented the flow both of the daily water and the rain water. The defendants denied that they had blocked up this hole in the wall or that they had blocked up any drain. They admitted that the plaintiff had a right to drain off all rain water from his compound through this hole across the defendants' land to the public drain. This right they did not for an instant contest; but they contested the plaintiff's right to send his dirty domestic" water through that hole on to their land. This they said had never come through the mohri A. According to the written statement of the defendants the drain is still in existence now as it used to be. But it will be remembered that it was the plaintiff's case that drain ran straight from mohri A in a straight line across the compound of the defendants and so on to the public drain. The presiding officer of the Court below apparently inspected the locality. He found that the drain did not run straight across the compound and that where, according to the plaintiff, the old drain used to run across the compound the defendants had built a cowshed and that the drain had now taken a circuitous route instead of a direct route across the compound. The Court below held that there was no doubt whatsoever that the plaintiff had passed not only the rain water from the house but also dirty water after domestic use through this drain and had done so regularly. It refused to accept the evidence of the defendants' witnesses, which was to the opposite effect. But it came to a curious conclusion. It held that because some eight or ten years ago the defendants had built their cowshed and had diverted the course of the drain across their compound, this was an obstruction to the exercise by the plaintiff of his right and that as this occurred more than two years before the suit the plaintiff failed to show that he had exercised his right peaceably and without obstruction up to a date within two years of the suit. As to the rain water the plaintiff's case was decreed; as to the passage of soiled water the plaintiff's claim was dismissed. The plaintiff comes here on second appeal. The point taken is that the mere diversion of the drain across the defendants' land is not an obstruction to the exercise, by the plaintiff, of the right which he claims. The right which the plaintiff claims is clearly right to pass his water, both soiled and rain water, through the mohri A across the defendants' land to the public drain. The fact that the defendants diverted the direction of the old route taken by the water in former days and now pass it by another' route does not, in my opinion, constitute an obstruction to the exercise of the plaintiffs' right at all. The plaintiff's right to flow water both dirty and rain water through the mohri A on to the defendants' land was not obstructed by the drain being diverted. It was immaterial to the plaintiff whether the defendants built the drain all round their compound or in a zigzag course so long as his right to pass water through the drain was not interfered with. Because the defendants have slightly altered the course of the drain it is impossible to say that the plaintiff's right has in any way been interfered with. The obstruction of which the plaintiff complained was an obstruction created within a period of six months before suit by the blocking up of the mohri A with bricks and stones. This the defendants totally denied having done. They do not claim a right to do so. The plaintiff claimed an injunction against the defendants ordering them to remove all obstructions from the mohri A and to leave it open and clear, so that both rain water and daily waste water might flow through it without hindrance and forbidding them ever to block it again and that a perpetual injunction might be issued against them restraining them from ever closing the aforesaid mohri and preventing the flow of daily waste water there through. The plaintiff's claim in regard to rain water has been decreed. He is equally entitled to a decree in respect of the daily waste water. I, therefore, order that in addition to the decree already passed in his favour he will have a decree declaring him entitled to pass his daily waste water through the mohri A on to the defendants' land and a perpetual injunction as against the defendants restraining them from blocking up the mohri A or in any way obstructing the plaintiff in passing his rain water as well as daily waste water through that mohri across the defendants' land to the public drain. The plaintiff will have his costs in all Courts.
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Title

Lachmi Narain vs Ram Sarup And Anr.

Court

High Court Of Judicature at Allahabad

JudgmentDate
17 June, 1915
Judges
  • Tudball