Gudalur Janmam Abolition Act

The Gudalur Janmam Estates Act (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) of 1969 was specially created for the Gudalur Taluk of Nilgiris District in Tamil Nadu State in India. The Act passed by the Tamilnadu State Legislature as Act 24/1969.

The object was to abolish the Jamindari system and to give the land to the cultivators or the tenant. But even after 37 years, the object of the act could not achieved by the enacters of the Act.

This Act is placed in the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution of India as entry Number 80. Therefore it is exempt from constitutional challenge on civil right grounds.

At present this Act affects two Talukas as the original Gudalur Taluka is bifurcated into Gudalur and Pandalur. In the guice of giving the lands to the cultivators/ tenant, the State Government has indirectly acquired large amount of land through this colorable legislation. The majority of the real tenants did not get the benefit of this Act. There are so many large scale lease holders whose land is classified as Section 17 of the Act.But at the same time there are so many small scale farmers whose land also wrongly classified as section 17 of the Act. There are some waste lands are also classified under Section 17.

Even before the State reorganization of Kerala and Tamilnadu (Madras) , a number of people migrated from different parts of the country, to work in the Coffee plantations, Tea plantations and Singona Plantations. Due to the after effects of the Second World war has caused severe famine through out the country. To overcome the famine, increasing the food production became necessary and therefore the Government invited the people to utilize the uncultivated lands and forests for the production of food and other agricultural products. Due to this invitation, many adventuristic people migrated to the Gudalur area from Travancore and Malabar. Then the intention of the migraters were only fight with the animals, Malaria and the unadjustable nature and to produce food and other agricultural products to sustain themselves and for the sustenance of his fellow being. Research scholar Mr. P.George Giri (Advocate,Supreme Court) has done detailed research on this topic.

The land in Gudalur area, excluding the forest lands, can be categorized as lands belonged to Nilambur Kovilakom, Naduvattu Mana, Nelliyalam Rathi, Kottar Kudiyiruppu, Kurichier Kudiyiruppu , plantations of the British era. Nilambur Kovilakam had more than 120000 acres of land. These land were janmam lands. After the State reorganization, the land belonged to Nilambur Kovilakam has gone to the cultivators who actually cultivated the land and they became the owners of the lands in their possession. This became possible because of the Land reform laws enacted during the period of the EMS Namboodiripad in 1957. thus the cultivater’s right has been protected in Kerala. Following this, the Tamilnadu Government enacted Gudalur Janmam Estates (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act, 1969, to protect the interests of the cultivaters of land in Gudalur. Though this Act has been passed by the State Legislature of Tamilnadu on 6th day of December 1967, it has came into effect only on 24th November 1974.

Few cases challenging the constitutionality of the Gudalur Janmam Estates (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act, is pending before the Honble Supreme Court of India and referred to a larger bench comprising of nine judges.