The East Indian Railway Company vs The Bengal Coal Company on 28 September, 1875

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Calcutta High Court
The East Indian Railway Company vs The Bengal Coal Company on 28 September, 1875
Equivalent citations: (1876) ILR 1 Cal 95
Author: Phear
Bench: Phear


JUDGMENT

Phear, J.

1. It now appears that the object of this suit is not, as I supposed at first, to enforce an equity against the defendant-company in regard to the user and enjoyment of its own land : but, to use the words of the learned Advocate-General, “the plaintiff asks that the defendant be restrained from passing beyond his boundary and committing a trespass on his, the plaintiff’s land,” and the line at which the plaintiff’ thus seeks to stop the defendant is not admitted by the latter to be his boundary line. On the contrary the defence is that the defendant’s land extends to a second line considerably beyond that specified by the plaintiff. The sole question in dispute between the parties is, whether the margin or strip of land between these two lines belongs to the plaintiff or to the defendant. The suit is substantially brought to have it declared as against the defendant that this strip belongs to the plaintiff, and it is, therefore, I think, a “suit for land” within the meaning of the 12th clause of our Letters Patent, as it has been interpreted by a long line of cases, which it is now too late to question. It is very different from the Howrah case Rajmohun Bose v. The East Indian Railway Co. 10 B.L.R. 241 where the only question was, whether defendant, a stranger, was liable for a trespass upon the plaintiff’s land, or a nuisance affecting him in the enjoyment of it, and where there was no question whatever between plaintiff and defendant, as to the plaintiff’s right to the land. And the express words of Clause 12 of the Letters Patent render the principles of the decision in Paget v. Ede L.R. 18 Eq. 118 inapplicable.

2. The suit must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction with costs on scale No. 2.

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