What are the Kinds of Possession in Property Law? Amaresh Patel BASICS OF LAW Fri, Feb 05, 2021, at ,03:40 PM Possession may be of many kinds. It may either be corporeal or incorporeal; mediate or immediate, constructive possession, adverse possession and so on.1. Corporeal and Incorporeal PossessionCorporeal possession is the possession of material things like land, house, buildings and movables like books, chattels etc, in the case of corporeal possession, the corpus consists firstly in confirming exclusion of other’s interference and secondly in the enjoyment of thing at will without external interference. Actual use of thing is, however, not necessary. Thus, a person may keep his watch locked in a safe for several years without using it, he would nevertheless be deemed to be in possession of it.Incorporeal possession, on the other hand, means possession of immaterial or intangible things which we cannot touch, see or perceive. The examples are possession of a copy-right or a trade mark or a right of reputation, goodwill, unlike corporal possession, in case of incorporeal possession, actual continuous use and enjoyment is deemed as an essential condition.2. Mediate and Immediate PossessionMediate possession is the possession of a thing through another person, it is also known as indirect possession. For instance, if I purchase a book through my agent or servant, I have mediate possession so long as the book remains in my agent’s or servant’s possession. Salmond points out three categories of mediate possession as follows;a. Possession acquired through an agent or servant;b. Possession held through a borrower or hirer or tenant where the res, i.e, the object can be demanded at will; andc. Where the property is lent for fixed period of time or delivered as security for the payment of a debt.3. Concurrent Possession or Duplicate Possession.The English civil law explicitly holds that two persons cannot be in possession of the same thing at one and the same time. Thus, exclusiveness is the essence of possession because two adverse claims of the exclusive use are not capable of effectual realization. It is, however, realized that there may be certain claims which are not adverse and are not therefore mutually destructive. Such claims could be concurrently realized. Such cases of concurrent possession are also called duplicate possession and are summarized by Salmond as follows:1. Mediate and immediate possession may co-exist as in case of possession of servant over his masteris thing where servant has immediate possession and master has mediate possession and the master has mediate possession.2. Two or more persons may possesses a thing in common just as in case of co-owners.3. Corporeal and incorporeal possession may co-exist in respect of the same material object. For example, a person may possess corporeal possession of piece of land while another may have the right of way on the same land which is incorporeal possession of it.4. Constructive PossessionAccording to Pollock, constructive possession is possession in law and not actual possession. It is right to recover possession. For instance, the delivery to keys of building or a warehouse may give rise to constructive possession of the contents to the transferee of the key. But Professor Keeton does not recognize this kind of possession because in his view, the delivery of key is more than a symbolic act, witnessing that possession has changed. The key is an instrument by virtue of which control of the building or warehouse is received and, therefore, with the key goes the control and consequently the possession. This is, therefore, a case of actual possession and not that of constructive possession. 5. Adverse PossessionAdverse possession implies the possession by person initially holding the land on behalf of some other person and subsequently setting up his claim as a true owner of that land. If adverse possession continues peacefully undisturbed for a prescribed period, the title of the true owner is extinguished and the person in possession becomes the true owner of that land. For establishing adverse possession, three elements are deemed necessary, viz, (i) continuity, (2) adequate publicity and (3) peaceful and undisturbed possession for prescribed period. In short, to be adverse, possession must be actual, exclusive and adequate in continuity and publicity and the exercise of possession should be without violence and without permission.