JUDGMENT M. Madhavan Nair, J. 1. This appeal is against a decree setting aside a revenue sale 16 acres of garden land in Kunnathukal village was sold in auction for Rs. 33/- on 25-11-1117 and purchased by the 2nd defendant, the appellant. The Additional District Judge, Trivandrum, set aside the sale on the ground that two of the four concerned landholders were dead at the relevant period and their legal representatives had not been brought on record before the sale was had. The appeal is against that decree preferred by the auction purchaser. 2. Counsel for the appellant contended that the plaintiffs' title to the suit property having been challenged by the appellant, the plaintiffs were bound to have proved their title thereto which they had not done and therefore the suit ought to have been dismissed. The plaintiffs had produced Ext. P. 1 judgment, and Ext. P. 2 decree of the District Court, Trivandrum, in A. S. Nos. 144 and 287 of 1104, and Ext. P. 3 decree of the Travancore High Court in S. A. No. 256 of 1109 affirming the same. The title of the plaintiffs' tarwad to the suit property had been declared in those judgments. The court below had accepted the same as prima facie proof of the plaintiffs' interest in the property and therefore held them competent to question the revenue sale and to seek recovery of the property. Counsel contended that the auction purchaser at a revenue sale is not a representative of the landholder but an assignee of the Government's interest in the land sold and as neither the appellant nor the Government had been a party to Exts. P. 1 to P. 3 the findings entered therein are of no value against him and therefore the plaintiffs must be held not to have discharged their burden of proof by the production of the aforesaid decrees and judgment. 3. The expression 'burden of proof' is used in two distinct meanings but very often the distinction is overlooked. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in Lakshmanna v. Venkateswarlu (AIR 1949 P. C. 278) observed: "What is called the burden of proof on the pleadings should not be confused with the burden of adducing evidence which is described as "shifting". The expression 'burden of proof' is used in two distinct meanings but very often the distinction is overlooked. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in Lakshmanna v. Venkateswarlu (AIR 1949 P. C. 278) observed: "What is called the burden of proof on the pleadings should not be confused with the burden of adducing evidence which is described as "shifting". The burden of proof on the pleadings never shifts, it always remains constant........the initial burden of proving a prima facie case in his favour is cast on the plaintiff; when he gives such evidence as will support a prima facie case, the onus shifts on to the defendant to adduce rebutting evidence to meet the case made out by the plaintiff. As the case continues to develop, the onus may shift back again to the plaintiff........When after the entire evidence is adduced, the tribunal feels it cannot make up its mind as to which of the version is true, it will hold that the party on whom the burden lies has not discharged the burden; but if it has on the evidence no difficulty in arriving at a definite conclusion, then the burden of proof on the pleadings recedes into the background". The initial burden of proof of plaintiffs' title to the property was no doubt on the plaintiffs themselves. They have produced judgments of competent civil courts declaring the title of their tarwad to the suit property. Not being judgments inter partes or in rem, the probative value of those judgments may be low ; nonetheless they cannot be said to be of no value as documents of plaintiffs' title. The plaintiffs having thus given some proof of their title the burden shifted on to the defendant either to prove a competing title in himself or to dislodge the evidence of the plaintiffs. Nothing has been done in this regard by the defendant. The court below was therefore right in holding on the evidence on record that the plaintiffs have proved to be interested in the property and therefore competent to question the revenue sale. 4. The contention that a revenue sale relates not to the defaulting landholder's interest in the land but of the Government's interest therein seems to me rather strange. The court below was therefore right in holding on the evidence on record that the plaintiffs have proved to be interested in the property and therefore competent to question the revenue sale. 4. The contention that a revenue sale relates not to the defaulting landholder's interest in the land but of the Government's interest therein seems to me rather strange. Counsel cited the following observations of their Lordships of the Privy Council in Narayan Das Khettry v. Jatindra Nath Chowdhury (54 I. A. 218): "It was not disputed that if the plaintiff's case was based upon a conveyance by the late proprietor of the land, the house would pass with the land to the purchaser; but it was argued on behalf of the defendants that the sale in question was under Act XI of 1859 it was merely a sale by the Collector of the Government's interest. "This part of the defendants' contention is, in their Lordships opinion, correct; for in Maharaja Surja Kanta Achariya v. Sarat Chandra Roy Chaudhuri (18 Cal. W. N. 1281, 1285) the judicial committee held that on the failure of an owner to pay the Government assessment, his estate or interest in the land is forfeited or rather determined, and that by a sale held under Act XI. of 1859, what was sold was not the interest of the defaulting owner, but the interest of the Crown, subject to the payment of the Government assessment." 5. Whatever be the position under Central Act XI of 1859 read with the Bengal Act VII of 1868, there can be no doubt that a sale under the Travancore evenue Recovery Act I of 1068 or of Travancore - Cochin Revenue Recovery Act VII of 1951 is of the land of the defaulting landholder only. Here, the sands registered in the names of ryots belong to them as their "private, heritable, saleable and otherwise transferable property". (See S.2 of the Proclamation dated the 2nd June 1865 -- Travancore Acts & Proclamation, Vol. I, page 5). S.5 and 41 of the Travancore Revenue Recovery Act provided : "5. When Public Revenue due on land may be in arrear, such arrear ........ may be recovered by the sale of the defaulter's movable or immovable property or both ............ 41. I, page 5). S.5 and 41 of the Travancore Revenue Recovery Act provided : "5. When Public Revenue due on land may be in arrear, such arrear ........ may be recovered by the sale of the defaulter's movable or immovable property or both ............ 41. It shall be lawful to the Division Peishkar or Tahsildar to attach or sell the whole or any portion of the land of a defaulter for the recovery of arrears of revenue. ........." In view of the above clear provisions in the Act, nothing further is needed to show that a revenue sale in this State is of the defaulter's property and not of Government's property. In spite of the Privy Council dictum (cited above) it is difficult for me to understand why the Government's interest in the land should be sold in auction for realisation of Government's dues therefrom. Suffice it to say here that nothing in the Travancore Revenue Recovery Act, 1068, under which the instant revenue sale took place, or, in the Travancore - Cochin Revenue Recovery Act, 1951, lends support to the contention that the interest sold at a revenue sale is the Government's interest in the land, and not of the defaulting landholder's. 6. Counsel for the appellant then contended that since possession of the property was not with the plaintiffs' but with their mortgagee, who is no party to this action, decree cannot be given to the plaintiffs for recovery of the property in this suit. The revenue sale to the defendant was free of encumbrances. For purposes of that sale that is to say, all the interests of the plaintiffs and their mortgagee passed to the appellant under the revenue sale, the mortgagee's interests were identified in the landholder; or else a proceeding against the landholder-mortgagor could not have effected the mortgagee's interests in the property as it really did under the sale. When that sale is set aside the auction purchaser cannot contend that the land-holder had only a mortgagor's interest in the land sold. What was good at conferment of title on him at the revenue sale must necessarily be good at its avoidance also. So far as the auction purchaser is concerned there is only one vestitive fact, namely the revenue sale. What was good at conferment of title on him at the revenue sale must necessarily be good at its avoidance also. So far as the auction purchaser is concerned there is only one vestitive fact, namely the revenue sale. When that is set at naught, he cannot claim to retain part of the interest conferred on him by that title which is avoided. The appellant is therefore bound to. surrender all the right, title and interest that he derived under the revenue sale when that is cancelled by decree of court. As he got them in a proceeding against the landholder he must surrender them to the landholder or his representative in the suit. Whether subsequent to his surrender the possession is to go to the mortgagee or the mortgagor is a matter between them in which the auction purchaser cannot have any concern. The ingenuity of counsel is the only possible meritorious element in this contention devoid of merit in other respects. All the contentions raised in this appeal are without substance. 7. The court below has allowed compensation for improvements effected on the land by the 2nd defendant to be assessed in execution and paid before she is ousted from the property. The plaintiffs respondents have preferred a cross objection against that direction. Under the Kerala Compensation for Tenants' Improvements Act, XXIX of 1958, "a person who comes into possession of land belonging to another person and makes improvements thereon in the bona fide belief that he is entitled to make such improvements" is a tenant entitled, on eviction from the land, to be paid compensation for the improvements made by him. The impugned direction is perfectly correct, and the cross objection against the same unwarranted. 8. In the result, both the appeal and the cross objection are dismissed with costs.