TWO CLASSES OF TENANTS 67 



proprietorship was subject, and a tendency arose for 

 the landlord to become an absolute owner, and the 

 cultivator a rack-rented tenant at a competition rent. 



' The most important legislative attempt to stop this 

 tendency and to declare what were the different classes 

 of tenants, what rights they respectively possessed, 

 and on what basis the claims to such rights should 

 be adjudicated, was made by passing Act X. of 1859, 

 which for many years was the sole embodiment of the 

 law of landlord and tenant for all the provinces in- 

 cluded in the Bengal Presidency. 



vj> \Lf >j> -V StL 



1 The main principle established by this law was 

 that undisturbed occupancy during a period of twelve 

 years should be the condition for acquiring immunity 

 from arbitrary ejectment or enhancement of rent. 

 Thus the cultivators became divided into two broad 

 classes — the privileged and the unprivileged. The 

 former, or the occupancy tenant, can only be ousted 

 by decree of Court, in consequence of non-payment 

 of rent ; and his rent cannot be enhanced except by a 

 decree of Court on certain specified grounds, of which 

 the principal one is, that he is paying at a lower rate 

 than is usual among other tenants of the same class 

 as himself for land of equal value. The unprivileged 

 class, or tenant-at-will, on the other hand, is liable to 

 be ousted at the pleasure of the landlord at the close 

 of any agricultural year, and his rent can be enhanced 

 to any sum which the landlord chooses to demand. 

 If, however, he or his ancestors have continued in 

 uninterrupted occupation of the same land for the 

 space of twelve years, he acquires by that lapse of 

 time a right of occupancy in his holding, and ceases to 

 be a tenant-at-will. 



1 In the North-Western Provinces in the earliest 

 regular settlements (made under the provisions of Regu- 

 lation VII., 1822, and Act IX. of 1833) rent rolls were 

 drawn up, in which all tenants residing and cultivating 



5—2 



