ANWARUL HAQ, C. J.--This second appeal is by two defendants against the concurrent judgment and decree of the two Courts below to the effect that the widow and the three daughters of the deceased Ali Muhammad were entitled to 10/24 shares in the agricultural property left by him when he died in 1955. The total area of the land in dispute is 25 acres, out of which the present appellants All Muhammad and Muhammad Hussain are the vendees of 9 acres and 3 kanals, which area was sold to them by Ghulam Qadir, the only son of the deceased. The rest of the area was sold by Ghulam Qadir to the respondents Muhammad Khan and Sharif who have not, however, come up in appeal to this Court. In fact they accepted the judgment of the trial Court.
2. The deceased Ali Muhammad acquired this land under the Colonization of Government Lands Act. It is common ground that he had paid all the instalments due in 1946, but no sale deed was executed in his favour until his death in 1955 In 1958 the land was mutated in its entirety in favour of his son Ghulam Qadir, who is a respondent in the present proceedings. This was presumably done in terms of section 20 of the Act. In 1964 Ghulam Qadir obtained patta malkiyat from the Collector and then made the two sales already mentioned. The widow and the daughters of All Muhammad filed the present suit on the 25th of June 1966 claiming their Muslim Law shares. The two Courts below have held that on the payment of the instalments due on the land All Muhammad became a proprietor, and, therefore, his succession was not governed by the provisions of the Colonization of Government Lands Act relating to inheritance of tenancies, but by the ordinary law of succession.
Both the Courts have repelled the contention that proprietary rights could not pass without registration of the sale deed in terms of section 54 of the Transfer of Property Act which is applicable to the territories of the former Bahawalpur State. In coming to this conclusion the Courts below have relied upon Faiz Ali v. Mst. Rafia Jan and 2 others and Ilam Din v. Muhammad Din .
3. It is contended by the learned counsel for the appellants that the Courts below have erred in relying upon the authorities mentioned above, as these authorities relate to the areas of former Punjab Province where section 54 of the Transfer of Property Act was not applicable. It is submitted that as long as the requirement of registration of the sale deed specified in section 54 of the Transfer of Property Act was not complied with, no title could pass to Ali Muhammad, with the result that on his death in 1955 there was only the tenancy to be inherited. As such, it is submitted, the land was rightly mutated in favour of the only son ofMuhammad under section 20 of the Colonization of Government Lands Act. It is further submitted that in any case, the other vendees, namely, Muhammad Sharif and Muhammad Khan, had colluded with the plaintiffs and therefore, a direction should have been made that the entire share of the plaintiffs would be taken out of the area sold to these two vendees, and the appellants shall not be touched as they were bona fide purchaser from Ghulam Qadir who had made it appear to them that he was the sole proprietor.
4. After hearing the learned counsel and examining the authorities in question, we are of the view that there is no merit in this appeal. The proposition enunciated in both the authorities is that proprietary rights pass to the purchaser once he has paid all the instalments due and has complied with the other conditions of the grant, and for this purpose it is not necessary that the final formal conveyance deed should be executed as required by section 175 of the Government of India Act, 1935 which was applicable to both these cases, however, their Lordships of the Supreme Court have gone further in the case of Ilam Din v. Muhammad Din and have observed that "ever since 1915, it had. in an unbroken line of cases, been held that in respect of obligations to third parties, the title in the property matures in favour of the purchaser when, transfer having been authorized the proper dues have been deposited . It is argued that, however, the case might lie as between the Government and the new proprietor, it is accepted on all hands by the Revenue Department as well as by the civil Courts, that proprietary title does pass when the payment has been made in full, sufficiently to be effective in relation to or as against third parties. Accordingly, I would hold without hesitation that the succession here in question does not fall to be determined under section 30-A aforesaid".
5, It seems to us that it is clear from these observations that what their Lordships were laying down was that in spite of the non fulfilment of the formalities relating to the drawing up and execution of the conveyance deed proprietary rights did accrue to the purchaser once the purchase was authorised and the transfer price had been paid, and that such rights were effective as against third parties in any case. Now, in the present case even though the conveyance deed may not have been registered as acquired by section 54 of the Transfer of Property Act, the possession of Ali Muhammad, when he died in 1955, must be regarded to be that of a proprietor as against third parties whatever the defect in his title as against the Provincial Government, that has no bearing on the question of succession when Ali Muhammad died in 1955.
6. There is yet another way of looking at the matter. We find that the deceased Ali Muhammad was to be regarded as a tenant of the property in dispute in terms of section 15 of the Colonization of Government Lands Act which lays down that "a purchaser from Government of Land who has been placed in possession of the land by order of the collector shall be deemed to be a tenant of such land until the full amount of the purchase money with any interest due thereon has been paid and the other conditions set forth in the statement of conditions of sale issued by the collector have been fulfilled". This section has to be read along with section 30 of the same Act which contemplates that "notwithstanding anything entered in any statement of conditions issued under Government Tenants (Punjab) Act, 1893, a tenant who, either in pursuance of any such condition or otherwise by agreements with, or under rules issued by Government, has acquired proprietary rights in any land included in his tenancy shall in respect of such land cases to be subject to any1 2 statement of conditions issued under the above-mentioned Act ; provided always that he shall in respect of such land be bound by the conditions set out in Schedule II of this Act and be bound by the other provisions of this Act applicable to proprietors of land".
7. It will be seen that the purchaser is to be deemed to be a tenant of the land in question until such time as the full amount of the purchase money has been paid and the other conditions set forth in the statement of conditions have been fulfilled. It is common ground that All Muhammad had paid the full amount of the purchase money and had obviously fulfilled all the other conditions of sale, except the drawing up and registration of the conveyance deed, which was not a condition within his power to fulfil. That was for the Collector or the Provincial Government to have done. It is thus clear that Ali Muhammad ceased to be a tenant in 1946 when he had paid the full amount of the purchase money and had fulfilled all the other conditions. Such being the case, no question arises of his succession being governed by section 20 of the Colonization of Government Lands Act. The case was clearly one of succession falling under the ordinary law. The widow and the daughters were, therefore, right in claiming their Muslim law shares.
8. The submission that the widow and the daughters should take their entire share from the other vendees, who had accepted their claim in the trial Court, is misconceived. The plaintiffs are entitled to joint possession in terms of the decree. There can be no question of passing a decree against one set of vendees and refusing it as against the others. The vendees have obviously to be confined to the share of Ghulam Qadir which is 14/24 in the entire estate.
9. For the foregoing reasons, the appeal fails and is hereby dismissed in limine. PLD 1956 Lah. 94 PLD 1964 SC 842