JUDGMENT Mukerji, J.
1. This is a Letters Patent appeal by the defendants who have lost throughout this litigation. The facts, briefly are these : The land in dispute is now numbered as plot No. 528 and formerly it was numbered as 524. It has a small area. The defendants gave a Qabuliat to the plaintiff in the year 1903 and the lease was to be a permanent one. Later on, on 13th May 1915 the defendants relinquished the perpetual lease and took the land in suit with some other lands for a period of three years for purposes of cultivation. The earlier lease was a building lease. The plaintiff sued the defendants for ejectment in the Revenue Court in 1921, but by a judgment dated 15th March 1922 the Assistant Collector dismissed the suit in respect of the plot now in suit but decreed it in respect of the other plots. We have been taken through the judgment of the learned Assistant Collector. It appears that the ground taken by him in dismissing the suit in respect of the plot in dispute was that the land had not been taken for agricultural purposes but for building purposes. He referred to the Qabuliat of 13th January 1903. Apparently the subsequent lease of 1915 was not produced before the learned Assistant Collector. The judgment of the Assistant Collector was upheld by the Commissioner and by the Board of Revenue. Later on, in 1927, the plaintiff brought a suit for ejectment of the defendants. That suit failed be cause the learned Munsif who decided (held that notice to quit was necessary and no notice had been given.
2. Then the plaintiff commenced the suit out of which the present appeal has arisen in 1929. A notice was given to the defendants stating that they should vacate the land on 13th May 1927. The notice was given on 9th November 1927. The suit was decreed by the first Court and that decree has been upheld, as we have said, by the lower appellate Court and by this, Court. Several points have been argued before us. The first question is as to whether the plaintiff could eject the defendants through the civil Court. We have no doubt that this plea has no force. The revenue Court held, in respect of the plot in dispute, that it was a building lease, and if that was so it followed that the revenue Court had no jurisdiction to pass any order of ejectment. The question whether the defendants could be ejected through the revenue Court was decided in the negative in the earlier litigation and if that judgment be binding on the defendants, the civil Court is the only Court to decree ejectment.
3. The next point argued is that the lease could be determined only by a valid notice. The point urged is that the notice should have stated that the defendants were to vacate the land on 13th May 1928 and not on 13th May 1927. This was merely a case of an accidental slip. Both the Courts below have found that the mention of the date 13th May 1927 in the notice was an accidental slip for 13th May 1928. We ourselves have no doubt that such is the case. The learned Single Judge of this Court, against whose judgment this appeal has been filed, was also of the same opinion. Their Lordships of the Privy Council have laid down in the case of Harihar Banerji v. Ramshashi Roy A.I.R. 1918 P.C. 102 that notices should be liberally construed and the only point to be considered in respect of notices is whether the person on whom a notice is served could understand what was really meant by the notice. As notice in this particular case was given on 9th November 1927 the defendants could never have understood it to mean that the plaintiff wanted them to vacate the land at a date which had already expired. Their Lordships in delivering the judgment referred to several English cases the most important of whidh for our purposes is the case of Doe d. Williams v. Smith (1836) 5 A. & E. 350 There the language of the notice indicated that the party to whom notice was given was to vacate the land on 2nd February 1834. Their Lordships held that in the circumstances of the case the lessee must have understood that the plaintiff meant 2nd February 1835 and not 2nd February 1834, Lord Denmen, C.J., remarked : "There was no danger of the tenant being misled." Littledale, J., remarked : "This is certainly a lame and inaccurate notice, but such as it is, we must endeavour to give it a rational interpretation." Patterson, J., remarked : "This is not drawn with strict precision but I think it is sufficiently clear." Following the decision of their Lordships of the Privy Council, we hold the notice given in this case was good in law. The next argument was that the appellants were permanent tenants, and the Qabuliat executed later on did not alter their position. The Qabuliat however did alter their position. The permanent lease was capable of being surrendered and when a subsequent Qabuliat in writing and registered was given the former lease was surrendered. With the Qabuliat there was also executed an express deed of surrender. In the result the appeal fails and is hereby dismissed with costs.