Stipulating a fixed portion in sharecropping

Question

Question: Zayd has a piece of land of which it has been estimated that it yields twenty maunds (a unit of weight, ≈ 37 kg) of paddy every year, and a hundred bundles of grass. Now Zayd could not farm this land himself; rather, owing to some constraint, he said to ‘Umar: “Farm this land and give me out of its produce only eight maunds of paddy and forty bundles of grass every year, and the rest of the produce will all be yours.” Now please state whether giving the land on this condition will be permissible or not.

Answer

Dealing in this way is not permissible. However, if the restriction “give it out of its produce” is not imposed, but the deal is made for eight maunds of paddy and forty bundles of grass unconditionally — whether it be bought from the market or obtained in some other way — then it is correct.

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

Preview. The full text opens with JavaScript enabled.