RAJKUMAR DEVINDRA SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellants filed a writ petition before the High Court of Punjab for the issue of an appropriate writ or order quashing a notice dated June 21, 1961, issued under S. 4 (1) of the Punjab Public Premises and Land (Eviction and Rent Recovery) Act, 1959, hereinafter called the 'Act', directing the 2nd appellant to show cause why an order of eviction should not be passed against him in respect of the premises in question.

(2.) The appellant's case (supra) was as follows. On the demise of the late Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, his eldest son, Maharaja Yadavindra Singh succeeded to the gaddi of the erstwhile State of Patiala which subsequently merged with the State of Punjab. Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, along with his sons including the appellants, constituted a joint Hindu family. The appellants along with the other sons of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh had an interest, by virtue of their being coparceners, in all the properties of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh. The appellants, along with their brothers, were in occupation of a property known as "Colonel Mistry's House", Moti Bagh Palance, Patiala, in their own right as the sons of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh. It was an ancestral property in the hands of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh and they were residing as members of the family in the said property. On March 10, 1958, Maharaja Yadavindra Singh sold Moti Bagh Palace to the Government of Punjab, as property belonging to him, and delivered actual possession of certain portion and agreed to deliver possession of the rest subsequently. The State Government was not competent to evict them under the provisions of the Act as they were not in unauthorized occupation of any public premises and that the impugned notice was issued without jurisdiction.

(3.) The counter affidavit on behalf of respondents 1 and 2 was filed by Shri S. P. Jain, Deputy Secretary to the Government of Punjab and it stated that there was no proof that the appellants were the sons of Maharaja Bhupendra Singh, that Bhupinder Singh and his sons were not members of a Hindu Undivided Family; that the Maharaja and his progeny being Jats, did not constitute a Joint Hindu Family and that the appellants never acquired any interest by birth in the property. The counter affidavit did not admit the allegation of the appellants that they were in possession of the property as coparceners.