Santbal A Saint with a Difference

Author(s): T U Mehta
Publisher: Navjivan Prakashan Mandir

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During the inquiry it was found that the complainant was fully justified in his complaint; but difficulty was that the person who had managed to get a change in the revenue records had paid up the original landlord the purchase price which a tenant was expected to pay under law to become the owner. There was Court litigation between the parties and the Court had passed interim order against the complainant. The complainant had grown about three thousand bundles of grass which were cut and taken away by the other party. Thus from legal point, the other party had made his case fool-proof and the complainant, whose case was just, stood to lose on all grounds.
Under these circumstances, one of the arbitrators proposed Faljibhai, who was Mandal Arbitrator, that the matter was so much complicated legally that they should leave the Arbitration and ask the parties to obtain their solution through Court. He, however, suggested that if the complainant was willing to keep half the land they would try to persuade the other side.
Faljibhai, who was fully trained in the philosophy of Santbal, disagreed and emphasised that as a representative of Khedut Mandal he would not countenance such illegal practices of tempering with revenue record.
Thus the matter was prolonged for some time but Court proceedings were going on. Finally the Arbitrator, who was reluctant to arbitrate, admitted that it was he who had advised the opposite side to manage revenue officers for the change of mutation and so he should not have agreed to act as an Arbitrator. He said he was now in a fix and, therefore, some compromise formula should be worked out.
Faljibhai, however, prevailed on moral grounds and finally the award which was given was completely in favour of the
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