LAND TENURES IN THE PANJAB 53 



a term of 3'ears, and in the interval left to the landholder the full benefit 

 of any extensions of cultivation or improvements which he might effect. 



The limitations which the near agnates of a landholder could impose 

 on his freedom of action are equally' clear. From the first a statement of 

 village customs was included in the record of rights of every estate, and these 

 documents furnish valuable evidence of the restricted nature of the tenure. 

 It became still clearer when some twent^'-five years after annexation set- 

 tlement officers were ordered to draw up statements of tribal customs in 

 every district in which a revision of the land revenue assessment was under- 

 taken. Of course custom varied, but the typical case was shown to be that 

 inheritance was confined to sons and, failing sons, to male agnates, to the 

 exclusion of daughters and their offspring, because by marriage the daugh- 

 ter passes into another family. The landholder had no power to interfere 

 by gift or will with the rule of descent, or even to give one son a larger 

 share than another. The sonless man could not rob his near agnates by 

 adopting an heir. If h^ adopted at all, he was bound to choose one of them. 



The early records of village custom were drawn up when sales and 

 mortgages were still very rare. A usual entry is — " Hitherto there have 

 been no sales or mortgages in this village. But, if at any future time a 

 proprietor should wish to sell or mortgage in order to pay the Government 

 revenue or provide for his own necessities, he must first offer it to his near 

 agnates ". This right of pre-emption as a means of preventing the intru- 

 sion of strangers into the village community was recognised in the ear- 

 hest Panjab Code of I^aw. Curiously enough the later tnbal records do 

 not deal directly with the all important question of the power of transfer 

 by sale or mortgage. By the time they were made the increased value, 

 of land had made it an object of desire to outsiders, and the action of the 

 courts had largely invaUdated the customary restrictions on alienation. 



The first settlement officers in the eastern and central districts found 

 groups of landholders organized in village communities. They were fa- 

 miliar with the type from experience gained in an adjoining province, and 

 this saved them from making mistakes. In a small village all the land- 

 holders would be found to be of one tribe and to claim descent from a com- 

 mon ancestor, in a large one groups of the same or of different tribes occu- 

 pied separate wards. The shares of the different wards, and of individual 

 landholders within the wards, at least in the common waste, were usually 

 based on relationship real or assumed. Each ward might hold its share 

 of the cultivated land in a single block or in several parcels. The indivi- 

 dual landholder as a rule had scattered fields so as to give him a share 

 of the manured land near the village site tmd of the various kinds of soil 

 in the outl^dng area. A great feature was the waste held in definite shares, 

 but of which the enjoyment was common. There sems to have been no 

 limitation of user. Every man put in as many cattle as he chose, and, 

 if he had the means, broke up suitable patches of land. The tiller of com- 

 mon land acquired no title. He merely had a right to retain on partition 

 so much as was not in excess of his share. British revenue law has emphasi- 

 zed the joint responsibility of members of the village community for pay- 



