Privy purse not a right: Supreme Court rejects compensation claim by Mizo chiefs for land taken in 1955

The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a plea alleging that Mizo Chiefs were not duly compensated when the lands they used to administer in the erstwhile Lushai Hills district (present-day Mizoram) were vested in the State after the abolition of the chieftainship system in 1955 [Mizo Chief Council Mizoram vs. Union of India & Ors.].

A Bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan found that the Council failed to prove that the Mizo chiefs held absolute ownership over the land that now forms the State of Mizoram. 

The Bench found that the petitioners relied mainly on historical writings and scholarly accounts to claim ownership of land. These, it said, were not sufficient proof.

"Upon a meticulous perusal of the said material, it is, at the very outset, highly ambiguous whether these texts unequivocally recognise the Mizo Chiefs as the absolute owners of the land ... It is legally untenable for this Court to rest a decision of such magnitude on the fragile foundation of such flimsy submissions and woefully inadequate proof,” it observed.

The Court also rejected the argument that the Mizo chiefs should be treated on par with the rulers of erstwhile princely States who were granted privy purses (annual payments in exchange for the surrender of their land) after Independence from British colonial rule.

The Court said this comparison was legally flawed. It observed that the privy purses granted to rulers of princely States arose from specific political negotiations and agreements entered into at the time of accession to the Indian Union. These arrangements were political agreements between the rulers and the government of India and did not create a general legal entitlement for other traditional authorities, the Court noted.

"The privy purses and other privileges granted to the erstwhile rulers of the Princely States were the direct outcome of specific, pre-constitutional political and contractual arrangements negotiated between those rulers and the Government. Consequently, it would be legally flawed to equate and elevate these entitlements to the status of a right, which all erstwhile rulers were constitutionally bestowed upon. Such political arrangements cannot be claimed as a matter of a legally enforceable right, much less a fundamental right," the March 13 ruling said.

The Court was hearing a plea filed in 2014 by the Mizo Chief Council on behalf of the tribal chiefs of the erstwhile Lushai Hills district and their legal heirs.

Historically, Mizo society was organised around a system of hereditary chiefs. Each chief administered a territory known as “Ram." The chiefs allotted farmland to villagers and collected customary tribute called “Fathang."

When the British annexed the Lushai Hills in the 1890s, they retained the chieftainship system for administrative convenience. However, the chiefs functioned under the supervision of colonial officials.

After Independence, the region continued to be administered as part of Assam. In 1954, the Assam legislature enacted the Assam Lushai Hills District (Acquisition of Chief’s Rights) Act. The law abolished the chieftainship system and allowed the State to acquire the chiefs’ rights over their territories.

In March 1955, the State issued a notification declaring that the rights and interests of the chiefs in their “Ram” would stand transferred to the State. Compensation was paid under the statute.

The chiefs later claimed that the compensation covered only the loss of certain privileges, such as the collection of Fathang. According to them, the State had effectively taken over their lands without paying compensation for the land itself.

Over the years, the chiefs made several representations to the government seeking compensation. They also approached the Gauhati High Court on two occasions. The High Court disposed of the matters without examining the merits and left the issue to be resolved by the government.

They then approached the Supreme Court in 2014.

Before the top court, the Union government and the State of Mizoram argued that the petition should be dismissed because it challenged actions taken nearly six decades earlier.

The Supreme Court, however, decided to examine the case on merits, despite the delay.

The Court said delay alone cannot bar a petition under Article 32 (enabling litigants to approach the Supreme Court for the enforcement of fundamental rights) of the Constitution if the delay is explained.

However, after examining the record, the Court concluded that the Council had failed to establish that the Mizo chiefs possessed absolute ownership over the land.

The Bench noted that the material relied upon by the Council consisted largely of historical writings and scholarly accounts, which did not conclusively prove proprietary title. The available boundary papers and records from the British administration also did not indicate that the chiefs held the land as private owners.

Thus, in the absence of proof of ownership, the Court held that the claim that the State had deprived the chiefs of property without compensation could not be sustained.

The court also rejected the argument that the compensation paid under the 1954 law was “illusory”. It said such a claim could only arise if ownership of the land was first established.

Accordingly, the Court dismissed the petition and held that the Mizo chiefs were not entitled to any compensation.

The Council was represented by advocates Lalremsanga Nghka, Kedar Nath Tripathy, Aditya Narayan Tripathy, Manoj Kumar Upadhyay, Siddhartha Jha, Gyanadutta Chouhan and Pallavi Sahu.

The Union and State were represented by Attorney General for India R Venkataramani, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and Senior Advocate Biswajit Deb, along with advocates Rajat Nair, Suhasini Sen, Chinmayee Chandra, Akshay Amritanshu, Sachin Sharma, Kartikay Aggarwal, Chitvan Singhal, Ameyavikrama Thanvi, Raman Yadav, Abhishek Kumar Pandey, Arvind Kumar Sharma, Anando Mukherjee, Shwetank Singh, Riya Dhingra, Utkarsh Anand, Mukesh Kumar Maroria, Aman Mehta and Chandan Ramamurthi.

[Read Judgement]